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I 



THE 



ODES AND EPODES 



OF 



H O R AC E 



THE 



ODES AND EPODES 



HORACE 



A METRICAL TRANSLATION INTO ENGLISH 



INTRODUCTION AND COMMENTARIES 



BY 

LORD LYTTON 



WITH LA TIN TEXT 



WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS 

EDINBURGH AND LONDON 

MDGCCLXIX 






V 



CONTENTS. 



INTRODUCTION. 

ON THE CAUSES OF HORACE'S POPULARITY, 



PAGE 

xiii 



THE ODES. 



BOOK I. 



I. 


DEDICATORY ODE TO MAECENAS, 




II. 


TO 


CESAR, 


III. 


ON 


VIRGIL'S VOYAGE TO ATHENS, 


IV. 


TO 


LUCIUS SESTIUS, 


V. 


TO 


PYRRHA, 




VI. 


TO 


M. VIPSANIUS AGRIPPA, 




vn. 


TO 


PLANCUS, 




VIII. 


TO 


LYDIA, 




IX. 


TO 


THALIARCHUS, 




X. 


TO 


MERCURY, 




XI. 


TO 


LEUCONOfi, . 




XII. 


IN CELEBRATION OF THE DEITIE 


S AND 






OF ROME, 




XIII. 


TO 


LYDIA, 




XIV. 


THE SHIP— AN ALLEGORY, 




XV. 


THE PROPHECY OF NEREUS, 




XVI. 


RECANTATION, . 




XVII. 


INVITATION TO TYNDARIS, 




XVIII. 


TO 


VARUS, 




XIX. 


TO 


GLYCERA, 




XX. 


TO 


MAECENAS, 




XXI 


IN 


PRAISE OF DIANA AND APOl 


.LO, 



THE WORTHIES 



24 

28 
32 

34 
38 
42 

44 
50 
52 
56 
60 
64 
68 
72 

74 
76 



VI 



CONTENTS. 



ODE 

XXII. TO ARISTIUS FUSCUS, 

XXIII. TO CHLOii, .... 

XXIV. TO VIRGIL ON THE DEATH OF QUINCTILIUS VARUS 
XXV. TO LYDIA, .... 

XXVI. TO L. ^LIUS LAMIA, 
XXVII. TO BOON COMPANIONS, 
XXVIII. ARCHYTAS, .... 
XXIX. TO ICCIUS, .... 
XXX. VENUS INVOKED TO CxLYCER.\'S FANE, 
XXXI. PRAYER TO APOLLO, . 
XXXII. TO HIS LYRE, 
XXXIIL TO ALBIUS TIBULLUS, 
XXXIV. TO HIMSELF, 
XXXV. TO FORTUNE, 
XXXVI. ON NUMIDA'S RETURN FROM SPAIN, 
XXXVII. ON THE FALL OF CLEOPATRA, 
XXXVIII. TO HIS WINE-SERVER, 



BOOK 11. 

L TO ASINIUS POLLIO, .... 
II. TO C SALLUSTIUS CRISPUS, GRAND-NEPHEW OF THE 

HISTORIAN, .... 

III. TO Q. DELLIUS, .... 

IV. TO XANTHIAS PHOCEUS, 

V. TO GABINIUS, .... 

VI. TO SEPTIMIUS, .... 

VIL TO POMPEIUS VARUS, 

VIII. TO BARINE, ..... 
IX. TO C. VALGIUS RUFUS, 

X. TO LICINIUS, ..... 
XI. TO QUINTIUS HIRPINUS, 

XII. TO M.'ECENAS, .... 

XIIL TO A TREE, ..... 
XIV. TO POSTUMUS, .... 

XV. ON THE IMMODERATE LUXURY OF THE AGE, 
XVI. TO POMPEIUS GROSPHUS, 

XVII. TO M/ECENAS, .... 

XVIII. AGAINST THE GRASPING AMBITION OF THE COVETOUS, 
XIX. IN HONOUR OF BACCHUS, . 
XX. ON HIS FUTURE FAME, 



CONTENTS. 



Vll 



BOOK III. 

ODE 

I. ON THE WISDOM OF CONTENT, 
II. THE DISCIPLINE OF YOUTH, . 
III. ON STEADFASTNESS OF PURPOSE, 
IV. INVOCATION TO CALLIOPE, 

V. THE SOLDIER FORFEITS HIS COUNTRY WHO SURREN 
DERS HIMSELF TO THE ENEMY IN BATTLE, 
VI. ON THE SOCIAL CORRUPTION OF THE TIME, 
VII. TO ASTERIA, ..... 
VIII. TO M^CENAS, ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF HORACE 
ESCAPE FROM THE FALLING TREE, 

IX. THE RECONCILIATION, 

X. TO LYCE, .... 
XI. TO THE LYRE, 

XII. NEOBULE'S SOLILOQUY, 
XIIL TO THE BANDUSIAN FOUNTAIN, 
XIV. ON THE ANTICIPATED RETURN OF AUGUSTUS FROM 
THE CANTABRIAN WAR, 
XV. ON AN OLD WOMAN AFFECTING YOUTH, 
XVI. GOLD THE CORRUPTOR, 
XVII. TO L. /ELIUS LAMIA, . 
XVIIL TO FAUNUS, .... 
XIX. TO TELEPHUS. — IN HONOUR OF MURENA'S INSTAL 

LATION IN THE COLLEGE OF AUGURS, 
XX. (OMITTED.) 
XXL TO MY CASK, .... 
XXIL VOTIVE INSCRIPTION TO DIANA, 
XXIIL TO PHIDYLE, . . . - 

XXIV. ON THE MONEY-SEEKING TENDENCIES OF THE AGE, 
XXV. HYMN TO BACCHUS, . 
XXVL TO VENUS, .... 

XXVII. TO GALATEA UNDERTAKING A JOURNEY, 
XXVIII. ON THE FEAST-DAY OF NEPTUNE, 
XXIX, INVITATION TO M^CENAS, 
XXX. PREDICTION OF HIS OWN FUTURE TIME, 



THE SECULAR HYMN, 



330 



VI 11 



CONTENTS. 



BOOK IV. 

ODE 

I. TO VENUS, ...... 

II. TO lULUS ANTONIUS, . . . . . 

III. TO MELPOMENE, . . . . . 

IV. IN PRAISE OF DRUSUS AND THE RACE OF THE NEROS, 
V. TO AUGUSTUS, THAT HE WOULD HASTEN HIS RETURN 

TO ROME, ..... 

VI. TO APOLLO, ..... 

VII. TO TORQUATUS, .... 

Vin. TO CENSORINUS, .... 

IX. TO LOLLIUS, . . . . . 

X. (OMITTED.) 

XI. TO PHYLLIS, . . . . . 

XII. INVITATION TO VIRGIL, 

XIII. TO LYCE, A FADED BEAUTY, . 

XIV. TO AUGUSTUS AFTER THE VICTORIES OF TIBERIUS 
XV. TO AUGUSTUS ON THE RESTORATION OF PEACE, 



34^> 

354 

35s 



THE EPODES. 



INTRODUCTION, ..... 
ErODE 

I. TO M^CENAS, .... 
II. ALFIUS. — THE CHARMS OF RURAL LIFE, 

III. TO M^CENAS IN EXECRATION OF GARLIC, 

IV. AGAINST AN UPSTART, . 
V. ON THE WITCH CANIDIA, 

VI. AGAINST CASSIUS, 
VII. TO THE ROMANS, 
VIII. (OMITTED.) 
IX. TO M^CENAS, .... 
X. ON M^VIUS SETTING OUT ON A VOYAGE, 

XT. and XII. (omitted. ) 

XIII. TO FRIENDS, . . . 

XIV. TO M^CENAS IN EXCUSE FOR INDOLENCE IN COM 

PLETING THE VERSES HE HAD PROMISED, 
XV. TO NEiERA, .... 

XVI. TO THE ROMAN PEOPLE (OR RATHER TO HIS OWN 

POLITICAL FRIEND.S), 
XVII. TO CANIDIA — IN APOLOGY, 
CANIDIA's REPLY, 



INTRODUCTION. 



ERRATA. ! 

Page 12, line 4 from bottom, for " Eiyx, read Eryx'." j 

74, line \o,for " Cales have" read " Cales has." j 

80, footnote. In quotation from Shakespeare's 'King John, i 

lines 2, 3, for ' ' her " read ' ' his. " ] 

362, line %for " victory, what time" read " vict'ry, since what , 

time." \ 

,, 367, line 6, for " Inster" read " Instar." 1 



taste, of the complex multitude of students in every land 
and in every age. 

It is an era in the life of the schoolboy when he first com- 
mences his acquaintance with Horace. He gets favourite 

a 



VIU CONTENTS. 



BOOK IV. 

ODE 



I. TO VENUS, ...... 342 

II. TO lULUS ANTONIUS, ..... 346 

III. TO MELPOMENE, ..... 354 

IV. IN PRAISE OF DRUSUS AND THE RACE OF THE NEROS, 35S 
V. TO AUGUSTUS, THAT HE WOULD HASTEN HIS RETURN 

TO ROME, ...... if^f, 



PLETING THE VERSES HE HAD PROMISED, . 462 

XV, TO NEyERA, ...... 464 

XVI. TO THE ROMAN PEOPLE (OR RATHER TO HIS OWN 

POLITICAL friends), .... 468 

XVII. TO CANIDIA— IN APOLOGY, .... 476 

canidia's reply, ..... 482 



INTRODUCTION. 



ON THE CAUSES OF HORACE'S POPULARITY. 

No one denies that there are greater poets than Horace ; 
and much has been said in disparagement even of some of 
the merits most popularly assigned to him, by scholars who 
have, nevertheless, devoted years of laborious study to the 
correction of his text or the elucidation of his meaning. 
But whatever his faults or deficiencies, he has remained 
unexcelled in that special gift of genius which critics define 
by the name of charm. No collection of small poems, 
ancient or modern, has so universally pleased the taste of 
all nations as Horace's Odes, or been so steadfastly secure 
from all the capricious fluctuations of time and fashion. In 
vain have critics insisted on the superior genius evinced in 
the scanty relics left to us of the Greek lyrists, and even on 
the more spontaneous inspiration which they detect in the 
exquisite delicacy of form that distinguishes the muse of 
Catullus. Horace still reigns supreme as the lyrical singer 
most enthroned in the affections, most congenial to the 
taste, of the complex multitude of students in every land 
and in every age. 

It is an era in the life of the schoolboy when he first com- 
mences his acquaintance with Horace. He gets favourite 

a 



XIV THE ODES OF HORACE. 

passages by heart with a pleasure which (Homer alone ex- 
cepted) no other ancient poet inspires. Throughout life the 
lines so learnt remain on his memory, rising up alike in gay 
and in grave moments, and applying themselves to varieties 
of incident and circumstance with the felicitous suppleness 
of proverbs. Perhaps in the interval between boyhood and 
matured knowledge of the world, the attractive influence of 
Horace is suspended in favour of some bolder poet adventur- 
ing far beyond the range of his temperate though sunny genius, 
into the extremes of heated passion or frigid metaphysics — 

" Visere gestiens 
Qua parte debacchentur ignes, 
Qua nebulae pluviique rores." 

But as men advance in years they again return to Horace 
— again feel the young delight in his healthful wisdom, his 
manly sense, his exquisite combination of playful irony and 
cordial earnestness. They then discover in him innumer- 
able beauties before unnoticed, and now enjoyed the more 
for their general freedom from those very efforts at intense 
emotion and recondite meaning for which, in the revolution- 
ary period of youth, they admired the writers v/ho appear 
to them, when reason and fancy adjust their equilibrium in 
the sober judgment of maturer years, feverishly exaggerated 
or tediously speculative. That the charm of Horace is thus 
general and thus imperishable, is a proposition which needs 
no proof. It is more interesting and less trite to attempt 
to analyse the secrets of that charm, and see how far the 
attempt may suggest hints of art to the numberless writers 
of those poems which aim at the title of lyrical composition, 
and are either the trinkets of a transitory fashion, or the 
ornaments of enduring vogue, according as they fail or 
succeed in concentrating the rays of poetry into the com- 
pactness and solidity of imperishable gems. 

The first pecuhar excellence of Horace is in his personal 
character and temperament rather than his intellectual capa- 



INTRODUCTION. / XV 

cities ; it is in his genial humanity. He touches us on so 
many sides of our common nature ; he has sympathies with 
such infinite varieties of men ; he is so equally at home with 
us in town and country, in our hours of mirth, in our mo- 
ments of dejection. Are we poor? he disarms our envy 
of the rich by greeting as a special boon of the Deity the 
suffisance which He bestows with a thrifty hand ; and, dis- 
tinguishing poverty from squalor, shows what attainable ele- 
gance can embellish a home large enough to lodge content. 
Are we rich ? he inculcates moderation, and restrains us from 
purse-pride with the kindliness of a spirit free from asceticism, 
and sensitive to the true enjoyments of life. His very defects 
and weaknesses of character serve to increase his attraction; 
he is not too much elevated above our own erring selves. 

Next to the charm of his humanity is that of his inclina- 
tion towards the agreeable aspects of our mortal state. He 
invests the virtues of patience amidst the trials of adversity 
with the dignity of a serene sweetness, and exalts even the 
frivolities of worldly pleasure with associations of heartfelt 
friendship and the refinements of music and song. Garlands 
entwined with myrtle, and wine-cups perfumed with nard, 
seem fit emblems of the banqueter who, when he indulges 
his Genius, invokes the Muse and invites the Grace. With 
this tender humanity and with this pleasurable temperament 
is blended a singular manliness of sentiment. In no poet 
can be found lines that more rouse, or more respond to, the 
generous impulse of youth towards fortitude and courage, 
sincerity and honour, devoted patriotism, the superiority of 
mind over the vicissitudes of fortune, and a healthful reli- 
ance on the wisdom and goodness of the one divine provi- 
dential Power, who has no likeness and no second, even ^ in 
the family of Olympus. 

Though at times he speaks as the Epicurean, at other 
times as the Stoic, and sometimes as both in the same 
poem, he belongs exclusively to neither school. Out of both 



XVI THE ODES OF HORACE. 

he has poetised a practical philosophy which, even in its 
inconsistencies, establishes a harmony with our own incon- 
sistent natures ; for most men are to this day in part Epi- 
curean, in part Stoic. Horace is the poet of Eclecticism. 

From the width of his observation, and the generalising 
character of his reasoning powers, Horace is more em- 
phatically the representative of civiHsation than any other 
extant lyrical poet. Though describing the manners of his 
own time, he deals in types and pictures, sentiments and 
opinions, in which every civilised time finds likeness and 
expression. Hence men of the world claim him as one of 
their order, and they cheerfully accord to him an admiration 
which they scarcely concede to any other poet. It is not 
only the easy good-nature of his philosophy, and his lively 
wit, that secure to him this distinction, but he owes much 
also to that undefinable air of good - breeding which is 
independent of all conventional fashions, and is recognised 
in every society where the qualities that constitute good- 
breeding are esteemed. Catullus has quite as much wit, 
and is at least as lax, where he appears in the character of a 
man of pleasure — Catullus is equally intimate with the great 
men of his time, and in grace of diction is by many preferred 
to Horace ; yet Catullus has never attained to the same 
oracular eminence as Horace among men of the w^orld, and 
does not, in their eyes, command the same rank in that 
high class of gentlemen — thorough-bred authors. For if we 
rightly interpret genius by ingenmm — viz., the inborn spirit 
which accommodates all conventional circumstances around 
it to its own native property of form and growth — there is a 
genius of gentleman as there is a genius of poet. That 
which his countrymen called urbanitas, in contradistinction 
to provincial narrowness of mind or vulgarity of taste, to 
false finery and affected pretence, is the essential attribute of 
the son of the Venusian freedman. And with this quality, 
wiiich needs for brilliant development familiar converse with 



INTRODUCTION. XVll 

the types of mind formed by a polished metropolis, Horace 
preserves, in a degree unknown to those who, like Pope and 
Boileau, resemble him more or less on the town-bred side of 
his character, the simple delight in rural nature, which makes 
him the favourite companion of those whom cool woodlands, 
peopled with the beings of fable, "set apart from the crowd." 
He might be as familiar with Sir Philip Sidney in the shades 
of Penshurst, as with Lord Chesterfield in the saloons of 
Mayfair. And out of this rare combination of practical 
wisdom and poetical sentiment there grows that noblest part 
of his moral teaching which is distinct from schools and 
sects, and touches at times upon chords more spiritual than 
those who do not look below the surface would readily 
detect Hence, in spite of his occasional sins, he has 
always found indulgent favour with the clergy of every 
Church. Among the dozen books which form the library of 
the village awe of France, Horace is sure to be one ; and 
the greatest dignitaries of our own Church are among his 
most sedulous critics and his warmest paneg}Tists. With all 
his melancholy conceptions of the shadow-land beyond the 
grave, and the half-sportive, half-pathetic injunction, there- 
fore, to make the most of the passing hour, there lies deep 
within his heart a consciousness of nobler truths, which 
ever and anon finds impressive utterance, suggesting pre- 
cepts and hinting consolations that elude the rod of Mercury, 
and do not accompany the dark flock to the shores of Styx : 

" Virtus recludens immeritis mori 
Coelum negata tentat iter via." 

Thus we find his thoughts interwoven with Milton's later me- 
ditations ; * and Condorcet, baffled in aspirations of human 
perfectibility on earth, dies in his dungeon with Horace by 
his side, open at the verse which says, by what arts of con- 

* See Milton's Sonnet xxi. , To Cyriac Skinner. 



XVlll THE ODES OF HORACE. 

stancy and fortitude in mortal travail Pollux and Hercules 
attained to the citadels of light. 

It is, then, mainly to this large and many-sided nature in 
the man himself that Horace owes his unrivalled popularity 
— a popularity which has indeed both widened in its circle 
and deepened in its degree in proportion to the increase of 
modern civilisation. And as the popularity is thus so much 
derived from the qualities in which the man establishes 
friendly intimacy with all ranks of his species, so it is ac- 
companied with that degree of personal affection which few 
writers have the happiness to inspire. We give willing ear 
to the praise of his merits, and feel a certain displeasure at 
the criticisms which appear harshly to qualify and restrict 
them ; we are indulgent to his faults, and rejoice when the 
diligent research and kindly enthusiasm of Geniian scholars 
redeem his good name from any aspersions that had been 
too lightly credited. It pleases us to think that most, per- 
haps all, among his erotic poems which had left upon our 
minds a painful impression, and which a decorous translator 
shuns, are no genuine expressions of the poet's own senti- 
ment or taste, but merely a Roman artist's translation or 
paraphrase from the Greek originals.*" We readily grant the 
absurdity of any imputation upon the personal courage of 
Brutus's young officer, founded upon the modest confession, 

* The opinion at which most Horatian scholars have now arrived 
is well expressed by Estre in his judicious and invakiable work, ' Ho- 
ratiana Prosopographeia ' : "Credo Horatium prorsus abstinuisse a 
puerorum amoribus, etiamsi ipse, jocans, aliter de se profiteatur. Dis- 
tabant, si quid judico, Horatii tempore, puerorum amores tantum a 
persona sancti castique viri quantum libera venus nostris temporibus 
abest. Novi autem hodie quoque, quis ignorat, juvenes virosque vel 
castissimos et sanctissimos, inter amicos, animi causa, ita jocantes, 
quasi liberam venerem ardentissime sectarentur. Nee Libri iv. carm. 
I, euro, scriptum, uti egregie observavit, Lessingius, post legem Juliam 
latam de pudicitia quum nemo amplius amorem in puerum palam cele- 
brare ausus fuisset." — P. 524. 



INTRODUCTION. XIX 

that on the fatal field of Philippi, when those who most 
vaunted their valour fled in panic or bit the dust, he too 
had left his shield not too valiantly behind him ; he who, in 
the same poem, addressed to a brother soldier, tells us that 
he had gone through the worst extremities in that bloody 
war. For those panegyrics on Augustus which, in our 
young days, we regarded as renegade flattery bestowed upon 
a man who had destroyed the political liberties for which the 
poet had fought, we accept the rational excuses which are 
suggested by our own maturer knowledge of life and of the 
grateful human heart, and our profounder acquaintance with 
the events and circumstances of the age. We see in the 
poems themselves, when fairly examined, with what evident 
sincerity Horace vindicates his enthusiastic admiration of a 
prince whom he identifies with the establishment of safety to 
property and life, with the restoration of arts and letters, 
\vith the reform of manners and the amelioration of laws. 
We can understand with what genuine horror a patriot so 
humane must have regarded the fratricide of intestine wars, 
and with what honest gratitude so ardent a lover of repose 
and peace would have exclaimed, — 

*' Custode rerum Csesare, non furor 
Civilis aut vis e'xii^et otium. " 

If to the rule of one man this blessed change was to be 
ascribed, and if public opinion so cordially endorsed that 
assumption, that the people themselves placed their ruler in 
the order of Divinities — it scarcely needs even an excuse for 
the poet that he joined in the general apotheosis of the great 
prince, who to him was the benignant protector and the 
sympathising friend. What has passed in our owq time in 
France renders more clear to us the general state of feeling 
in Rome. When the population have once tested the 
security of established order, and, with terrified remem- 
brance of the bloodshed and havoc of a previous anarchy, 



XX THE ODES OF HORACE. 

felt the old liberty rather voluntarily slip than be violently 
wrenched, from their hands, a benevolent autocracy that con- 
sults the public opinion which installs it, seems a blessing to 
the many, and is accepted as a necessity by the few. And 
if the professed statesmen and political thinkers of the time 
— the Pollios and the Messalas, the most eminent parti- 
sans of M. Antony, the noblest companions of Brutus — 
acquiesced, with the more courtly and consistent Maecenas, 
in the established government of Augustus, it would indeed 
be no reproach to a man whose mind habitually shunned 
gloomy anticipations of the distant future, that he could not 
foresee the terrible degeneration of manners and the military 
despotism which were destined to grow out of the clement 
autocracy of that accomplished prince who had won the title 
of "father of his country," and who might be seen on 
summer evenings angling in the Tiber, or stretched upon 
its banks amidst a ring of laughing children, with whom the 
Emperor whose word gave law to the Indian and the Mede 
was playing with nuts and pebbles. 

What Horace was as man, can, however, furnish but little 
aid to those v/ho desire to rival him as poet — ^little aid, in- 
deed, except as it may serve to show how far a genial and 
cordial temperament, an independent and manly spirit, and 
a fellowship with mankind in their ordinary pursuits and 
tastes, contribute to the culture and amenities of the poet 
who would make his monument more lasting than bronze and 
more lofty than the pyramids. But in Horace, as artist, we 
may perhaps, on close examination, discover some peculiari- 
ties of conception and form sufficiently marked and pervasive 
to evince that with him they were rules of art ; so successful as 
to make them worthy of study, and hitherto so little noticed, 
even by his most elaborate critics, as to justify an attempt to 
render them more generally intelligible and instructive. 

In what I am about to say on this head, I confine my 
remarks to the short lyrical pieces to which commentators 



INTRODUCTION. XXI 

after his time gave the name of Odes, and on which his 
eminence as a poet must mainly rely. Whatever merit be 
ascribed to his Satires, it is scarcely in the power of genius 
to raise satire to an elevated rank in poetry. Satire, indeed, 
is the antipodes of poetry in its essence and its mission. 
Satire always tends to dwarf, and it cannot fail to caricature ; 
but poetry does nothing if it does not tend to enlarge and 
exalt, and if it does not seek rather to beautify than deform. 
And though such didactic and m.oralising vein as belongs to 
the Epistles of Horace be in itself much higher than satire, 
and in him has graces of style that, with his usual consum- 
mate taste, he rejects for satire, which he regards but as a 
rhythmical prose, still, the higher atmosphere in which the 
genius of lyrical song buoys and disports itself is not within 
the scope of that didactic form of poetry which "walks 
highest but not flies." Hegel, in his luminous classification 
of the various kinds 'of poetry, has perhaps somewhat too 
sharply drawn the line between its several degrees of rank ; 
yet every one acquainted with the rudimentary principles of 
criticism must acknowledge, that just as it requires a larger 
combination of very rare gifts to write an epic or a drama 
which the judgment of ages allows to be really great, than 
to write a lyrical poem, so it demands a much finer combi- 
nation of some of the rarest of those rare gifts to write a 
lyrical poem which becomes the song of all times and 
nations, than to write a brilliant sarcasm upon human infir- 
mities, or an elegant lecture in the style of an Epistle. 
These last require but talents, however great, which are 
more or less within the province of prose-writers. The 
novel of ' Gil Bias ' or the Essays of Montaigne evince 
qualities of genius equal at least to those displayed in 
Horace's Satires and Epistles. But if you were to multi- 
ply Lesages and Montaignes ad infiiiitum^ they could not 
accomplish a single one of Horace's nobler odes. 

Now, the first thing that strikes us in examining the 



XXll THE ODES OF HORACE. 

secrets of Horace's art in lyrical poetry — and which I ven- 
ture humbly to think it would be well for modern lyrists to 
study — is his terseness. Terseness is one of the surest 
proofs of painstaking. Nothing was ever more truthful in 
art than the well-known reply of the writer to the friendly 
critic, who said, "You are too prolix :" "I had not time to 
be shorter." 

We know from Horace himself that he bestowed upon 
his artist-work an artist's labour — " Operosa carmina fingo." 
He seems to have so meditated upon the subject he 
chooses as to be able to grasp it readily. There is no wan- 
dering after ideas — no seeking to prolong and over-adorn 
the main purpose for which he writes. If it be but a votive 
inscription to Diana, in which he dedicates a tree to her, 
he does not let his command of language carry him beyond 
the simple idea he desires to express. He seems always to 
consider that he is addressing a very civilised and a very im- 
patient audience, which has other occupations in life besides 
that of reading verses ; and nothing in him is more remarkable 
than his study not to be tedious. Perhaps, indeed, it is to 
this desire that some of his shortcomings up to the mark 
which very poetical critics would assign to lyrical rapture are 
to be ascribed ; but it is a fault on the right side. 

The next and much more important characteristic of 
Horace as a lyrical artist is commonly exhibited in his 
grander odes, and often in his lighter ones ; and to this I 
do not know if I can give a more expressive word than 
picturesqueness. His imagination, in his Odes, predomin- 
ates over all his other qualities, great as those other 'quali- 
ties are ; and that which he images being clear to himself, 
he contrives in very few words to render it distinct and 
vivid to the reader. When Lydia is entreated not to spoil 
Sybaris ; by enumerating the very sports for which her lover 
has lost taste, he brings before us the whole picture of an 
athletic young Roman noble — his achievements in horse- 



INTRODUCTION. XXlll 

manship, swimming, gymnastics; when, in the next ode, 
he calls on the Feastmaster to heap up the fagots, and 
bring out the wine, and enjoy his youth while he may, he 
slides into a totally different picture. Here it is the young 
Roman idler, by whom only the mornings are devoted to 
the Campus Martius, the afternoons to the public lounge, 
the twilights to amorous assignations ; and the whole closes 
still with a picture, the girl hiding herself within the thresh- 
old, and betrayed by her laugh, while the lover rushes in 
and snatches away the love-token from the not too reluctant 
finger. When he invites Tyndaris to his villa, the spot is 
brought before the eye : the she-goats browsing amid the 
arbute and wild thyme ; the pebbly slopes of Ustica ; the 
green nook sheltered from the dog-star; the noon-day 
entertainment; the light wines and the lute. The place 
and the figures are before us as clearly as if on the canvas 
of a painter. He would tell you that he is marked from 
childhood for the destiny of poet ; and he charms the eye 
with the picture of the truant infant asleep on the wild 
mountain-side, safe from the bear and the adder, while the 
doves cover him with leaves. 

With a rarer and higher attribute of art Horace intro- 
duces the dramatic element very largely and prominently 
into his lyrics. His picture becomes a scene. His ideas 
take life and form as personations. Does he ^vish to dis- 
suade his countrymen from the notion of transferring the 
seat of government from Rome to Asia, or perhaps, rather, 
from some large emigration and military settlement in the 
East ? He calls up the image of the Founder of Rome 
borne to heaven in the chariot of Mars ; ranges the gods 
in council on Olympus ; and puts into the lips of Juno 
the warning which he desires to convey. Does he seek to 
discourage popular impatience for the return of the Parthian 
prisoners — viz., the soldiers of Crassus who had settled and 
married in the land of the conqueror? He evokes the 



XXIV THE ODES OF HORACE. 

great form of Regulus urging the Senate to refuse to 
ransom the Roman captives taken by Carthage — places 
him as on a visible stage — utters his language, describes his 
looks, and shows him departing to face the tormentors, 
satisfied and serene. Would he console a girl for the ab- 
sence of her lover, and hint to herself a friendly caution 
against an insidious gallant ? In eight short stanzas he con- 
denses a whole drama in personages and plot. Does he paint 
the reconcihation of two jealous lovers? He makes them 
speak for themselves ; and their brief dialogue is among the 
most delightful of comedies. Would he tell us that he is going 
to sup with convivial friends? He suddenly transports us 
into the midst of the scene, regulates the toasts, calls for the 
flowers and music, babbles out his loves. The scene lives. ^ 

Not to weary the reader with innumerable instances of 
this art of picture and of drama, so sedulously cultivated by 
Horace, I will only observe that the various imitators of 
Horace have failed to emulate this the most salient char- 
acteristic of his charm in construction ; and that even his 
numerous commentators have but slightly noticed it — nay, 
some have even censured as a desultory episode, that which, 
according to Horace's system of treating his subject, is the 
substance of the poem itself For the commencing stanzas 
sometimes only serve as a frame to the picture which he 
intends to paint, or a prologue to the scene which he pro- 
poses to dramatise. 

Thus he begins a poem by an invocation to Mercury and 
the lyre to teach him a strain that may soften the coy heart of 
a young girl ; passes rapidly to the effect of music even upon 
the phantoms in the shades below ; the Danaides rest their 
urn, and then, as if the image of the Danaides spontaneously 
and suddenly suggested the idea, he places on the scene the 
sister murderesses at night slaughtering their bridegrooms — 
and the image of Hypermnestra, the sole gentle and tender 
one, waking her lord and urging him to fly. 



INTRODUCTION. XXV 

So again, when his lady friend, Galatea, is about to 
undertake a voyage, he begins by a playful irony about 
omens, hastens to the reality of stormy seas — and suddenly 
we have the picture of Europa borne from the field-flowers 
to the midst of the ocean. We behold her forlorn and 
alone on the shores of Crete — hearken to the burst of her 
despair and repentance — and see the drama conclude with 
the consolatory appearance of Venus, and Cupid with his 
loosened bow. To some commentators these vivid pre- 
sentations of dramatic imagery have appeared exotic to 
the poem — episodes and interludes. But the more they* 
are examined as illustrative of Horace's peculiar culture of 
lyric art, the more (in this respect not unimitative of Pindar) 
they stand out as the body of his piece, and the developed 
completion of his purpose. Take them away, and the 
poems themselves would shrink into elegant vers d' occasion. 
Horace, in a word, generally studies to secure to each of his 
finer and more careful poems, however brief it be, that 
which play-writers call "a backbone." And even where he 
does not obtain this through direct and elaborate picture 
or dramatic effect and interest, he achieves it perhaps in 
a single stanza, embodying some striking truth or maxim of 
popular application, expressed with a terseness so happy, 
that all times and all nations adopt it as a proverb. 

We see, then, how much of his art in construction de- 
pends on his lavish employ of picture and drama — how 
much on compression and brevity. We must next notice, 
as constituent elements of Horace's peculiar charm, his em- 
ployment of playful irony, and the rapidity of his transitions 
from sportive to earnest, earnest to sportive ; so that, per- 
haps, no poet more avails himself of the effect of ''surprise" 
— yet the surprise is not coarse and glaring, but for the 
most part singularly subdued and delicate — arising some- 
times from a single phrase, a single word. He has thus, 
in his lyrics, more of that combination of tragic and comic 



XXVI THE ODES OF HORACE. 

elements to which the critics of a former age objected in 
Shakespeare, than perhaps any poet extant except Shake- 
speare himself The consideration of this admirably artistic 
fidelity to the mingled yarn of life, leads us on to the notice 
of Horatian style and diction. 

The character of the audience he more immediately ad- 
dresses will naturally have a certain effect on the style of an 
author, and an effect great in proportion to his practical 
good sense and good taste. No man possessed of what 
the French call savoir vivi'e, employs exactly the same style 
even in extempore discourse, whether he address a select 
audience of scholars or a miscellaneous popular assem^bly. 
The readers for whom Horace more immediately wrote were 
the polite and intellectual circles of Rome, wherein a large 
proportion were too busy, and a large proportion too idle, 
to allow themselves to be diverted very far, or for long at 
a stretch, into poetic regions, whether of thought or diction, 
remote from their ordinary topics and habitual language. 
Horace does not, therefore, in the larger number of songs 
composed — some to be popularly sung and all to be popu- 
larly read — build up a poetic language distinct from that of 
conversation. On the contrary, with some striking excep- 
tions, where the occasion is unusually solemn, he starts from 
the conversational tone, seeks to famiharise himself winning- 
ly with his readers, and leads them on to loftier senti- 
ment, uttered in more noble eloquence — just as an orator, 
beginning very simply, leads on the assembly he addresses. 
And possibly Horace's manner in this respect — which, 
though in a less marked degree, is also that of Catullus in 
most of the few purely lyrical compositions the latter has 
left to us — may be traced to the influence which oratory 
exercised over the generation born in the last days of the 
Repubhc. For in the age of Cicero and Hortensius it may 
be said that the genius of the Roman language developed 
itself rather in the beauties which belong to oratory than 



INTRODUCTION. XXVll 

those which lie more hidden from popular appreciation in 
the dells and bosks of song. 

And as the study of rhetoric and oratory formed an es- 
sential part of education among the Roman youths contem- 
porary with Horace, so that study would unconsciously 
mould the taste of the poet in his selection and arrange- 
ment of verbal decorations. Be the cause what it may, 
nothing is more noticeable in Horace's style than its usual 
conformity with oratorical art, its easy familiarisation with 
the minds addressed, its avoidance of over-floridity and re- 
condite mysticism, and its reliance for effects that are to 
fascinate the imagination, touch the heart, rouse the soul, 
upon something more than the delicacies of poetic form. 
His reliance, in short, is upon the sentiment, the idea, 
which the glow of expression animates and illumes. Thus 
that curiosa felicitas verborum justly ascribed to Horace, has 
so much of the masculine, oratorical character — so unites a 
hardy and compact simplicity of phrase with a sentiment 
which itself has the nobleness or grace of poetry (as orator- 
ical expression of the highest degree ever has) — that of all 
ancient poets Horace is the one who most furnishes the 
public speaker with quotations sure of striking effect in 
any public assembly to which the Latin language is familiar. 
Take one example among many. Mr Pitt is said never 
to have more carried away the applause of the House of 
Commons than when, likening England, — then engaged in 
a war tasking all her resources, — to that image of Rome 
which Horace has placed in the mouth of Hannibal — he 
exclaimed : — 

" Duris ut ilex tonsa bipennibus 
Nigrse feraci frondis in Algido, 
Per damna, per csedes, ab ipso 
Ducit opes animumque ferro." 

Now, this passage, when critically examined, does not owe 
its unmistakable poetry to any form of words, any startling 



XXVlll THE ODES OF HORACE. 

epithet, inadmissible in prose, but to an illustration at once 
very noble and yet very simple ; and, in rapidity of force, in 
the development and completion of the idea, so akin to 
oratory, that an impassioned speaker who had his audience 
in his hands might have uttered the substance of it in prose. 
I may perhaps enable the general reader to comprehend 
more clearly what I mean by Horace's art in diction, as 
starting from the conversational tone, and, save on rare oc- 
casions, avoiding a style antagonistic to prose, by a reference 
to the two loveliest, most elaborate, and most perfect lyrics 
in our own language — 'L' Allegro' and 'II Penseroso.' In 
these odes Milton takes for representation the two types of 
temperament under which mankind are more or less divisibly 
ranged — viz., the cheerful and the pensive. But he treats 
these two common varieties of all our race as a poet, of a 
singularly unique temperament himself, addressing that com- 
paratively small number of persons who are poetically cheer- 
ful or poetically pensive. And in so addressing them his 
language is throughout essentially distinct from prose ; it is 
like most of his youthful poems, the very quintessence of 
poetic fancy, both in imagery and expression. Perfectly 
truthful in itself, the poetry in these masterpieces is still not 
of that kind of truthfulness which comes home to all men's 
business and bosoms. Like his own soul, it is "a star, and 
dwells apart." It may be doubted whether Horace, in his 
very finest odes, ever, in his maturest age, wrote anything so 
exquisitely poetical, regarded as pure poetry addressed to 
poets, as these two lyrics written by Milton in his youth. 
But then the difference between them and Horace's Ode? 
is, that out of England the former are little known — certainly 
not appreciated.* Their beauty of form is so delicate, that 



* It may be said in answer to this, that on the Continent Latin is more 
read than English. True ; but that does not prevent those EngHsh poets 
who address themselves to a cosmopoHtan audience, as Shakespeare, 



INTRODUCTION. - XXIX 

it is only the eye of a native that can detect it — their truth- 
fulness to nature so Hmited to a circumscribed range of 
mind, that, even in England, neither the mirthful nor the 
melancholy man, unless he be a poet or a student, recog- 
nises in either poem his own favourite tastes and pleasures. 
But where Horace describes men's pleasures, every man 
finds something of himself; the familiar kindliness of his 
language impresses its poetry upon those who have no pre- 
tension to be poets. Had Horace wTitten with equal length 
and with equal care an ' Allegro ' and a ' Penseroso,' not 
only the poet and the student, not only the man of senti- 
ment and reflection, but all varieties in our common family 
— the young lover, the ambitious schemer, the man of plea- 
sure, the country yeoman, the city clerk, even the rural 
labourer — would have found lines in which he saw himself 
as in a mirror. 

Thus, then, Horace's exquisite felicity of wording is for 
the most part free from any sustained attempt at a language 
essentially distinct from that of conversation ; and for that 
very reason its beauties of poetical expression both please 
and strike the more, because they have more the air of those 
spontaneous flashes of genius which delight us in a great 
orator or a brilliant talker. 

I cannot pass by without comment a characteristic of 
Horace's "form" in lyrical poetry, which is too striking to 
escape the notice of any ordinary critic; but no critic has 
attempted satisfactorily to define the principles of art to 
which its peculiar fascination may be traced. It is in the 
choice of epithets derived from proper names, or rather the 
names of places, by which "generals" are individualised 
into " particulars." The sea is not the sea in general — it is 

and I may add Byron, being as well appreciated on the Continent as 
any Latin author is ; and I doubt whether even in England there be as 
many readers of poetry familiar with ' L' Allegro ' and ' II Penseroso ' as 
there are with the Odes of Horace. 



XXX THE ODES OF HORACE. 

the Hadrian, or the Myrtoan, or the Caspian sea ; the ship 
is not a ship in general — it is the Cyprian or the Bithynian 
ship ; the oaks, which are not always shaken by the blast, are 
not the oaks in general — they are the oaks upon Garganus ; the 
ilex, which thrives by being pruned, is not an ilex in general 
— it is the ilex upon Algidus ; and so forth, through innumer- 
able instances. That in this peculiarity there is a charm to 
the ear and the mind of the reader, no one acquainted with 
Horace will deny. But whence that charm? Partly be- 
cause it gives that kind of individuality which belongs to 
personation — it takes the object out of a boundless common- 
place, and rivets the attention on a more fixed and definite 
image ; but principally because, while it thus limits the idea 
on the prosaic side of the object, it enlarges its scope, by 
many vague and subtle associations, on the poetic side. 
When a proper name is thus used — a proper name suggesting 
of itself almost insensibly to the mind the poetic associations 
which belong to the name — the idea is enlarged from a 
simple to a complex idea, adorned with delicate enrichments, 
and opening into many dim recesses of imagination. The 
keel of a ship suggests only a keel ; but the Cyprian keel 
connects itself with dreamy recollections of all the lovely 
myths about Cyprus. The ilex unparticularised may be but 
an ilex by a dusty roadside, or in the grounds of a citizen's 
villa; but the ilex of Algidus evokes, as an accompanying 
image, the haunted mountain-top sacred to Diana. Hence 
the frequent recourse to poetic proper names among artistic 
poets, and to which the verse of Milton is so largely indebted 
for the delight it occasions, not more by melodious sounds 
than by complex associations. Walter Scott owes much of 
the animation of his lyrical narratives to his frequent use of 
proper names in scenery connected with historic association 
or romantic legend ; and Macaulay's Roman Lays push the 
use of them almost to too evidently artificial an extreme, 
savouring a Httle overmuch of elaborate learning and per- 



INTRODUCTION. XXXI 

ceptible imitation. But the study of so exquisite a beauty 
in lyrical composition may be safely commended to modern 
poets. It is noticeable that Horace has little or nothing 
of it in the Epodes (his earliest published poems, except the 
First Book of the Satires). Perhaps he thought it more espe- 
cially appropriate to purely lyrical composition, such as the 
Odes, than to the Epodes, which are not lyrical in form, 
and, with one exception, Epode xiii., are but partially lyrical 
in spirit. For it might be wrong to infer that it only oc- 
curred to him in the riper practice of his general art as poet, 
since some of the Odes in which it is found, though not 
published till after the Epodes, must have been composed 
within the period to which the latter are assigned. 

The defects or shortcomings of Horace as a poet are, like 
those of all original Avriters, intimately connected with his 
peculiar merits. His strong good sense, and that which may 
be called the practical tendency of his mind in his views 
both of life and art, w^hile they serve to secure to him so un- 
rivalled a popularity among men of the world, not only deter 
him from the metaphysical speculation which would have 
been not less wearisome to the larger portion of his readers 
than distasteful to himself, as appertaining to those regions 
beyond the province of the human mind, " at which Jove 
laughs to see us outstretch our human cares," — but rarely 
permit him to plumb very far into the deeps of feeling and 
passion. Marvellously as he represents the human nature 
we have all of us in common, each thoughtful man has yet 
in him a something of human nature peculiar to himself, 
which, like the goal of the Olympian charioteer, is some- 
times almost grazed, but ever shunned, by the rapid wheels 
of the Venusian. 

It may also be said that his turn for irony, or his defer- 
ence to the impatient taste of a worldly audience, while 
serving to keep the attention always pleased, and contributing 
so largely to his special secrets in art, sometimes shows itself 



XXXU THE ODES OF HORACE. 

unseasonably, and detracts from the effect of some noble 
passage, or interrupts the rush of some animated description. 

Take but one instance among many. In an ode which is 
among his grandest — Book IV. Ode iv., " Qualem ministrum 
fulminis alitem" — when he comes, after imagery of epic 
splendour, to the victory of Drusus over the Vindelici, he 
checks himself to say, with a sort of mockery which would 
have been well in its place at a supper-table, that where the 
Vindelici learned the use of the Amazonian battle-axe he 
refrains from inquiring, for it is not possible to know every- 
thing. No doubt there was some "hit" or point in this 
parenthetical diversion which is now lost to us ; possibly it 
was a satirical allusion to some pedantic work or antiquarian 
speculation which was among the literary topics of the day ; 
but every reader of critical taste feels the jar of an episodical 
levity, inharmonious to all that goes before and after it.'"" It 
is like a sarcasm of Voltaire's thrust into the midst of an ode 
of Pindar's. 

From causes the same or similar, Horace's love-poetry 
has been accused of want of deep feeling, and compared in 
this respect, disadvantageous^, to the few extant fragments of 
Sappho. But here it may be observed, that in the whole 
character of Horace there is one marked idiosyncrasy which 
influences the general expression of his art. Like many men 
of our day, who unite to familiar intercourse with fashionable 
and worldly society an inherent sincerity and a dread of all 
charlatanic pretences, Horace is even over-studious not to 
claim any false credit for himself — not to pretend to any- 
thing which may not be considered justly his due; he will 



* Some critics have indeed proposed to omit these digressive verses 
altogether, and consider them an impertinent interpolation by an inferior 
hand. But this is an audacity of assumption forbidden by the authority 
of manuscripts, and justly denounced by the editors and critics whose 
opinions on such a subject Horatian students regard as decisive. 



INTRODUCTION. xxxiii 

not pretend to be better born or richer, wiser or more con- 
sistent, or of a severer temper than he is. In his Satires and 
Epistles he even goes out of his way to tell us of his faults. 
In his Odes themselves — with all his intense and candidly 
uttered convictions of their immortality — he is perpetually 
throwing in some modest reference to the light and trivial 
themes to which his lyre and his genius are best suited. A 
man of this character, and with a very keen susceptibility to 
ridicule, would perhaps shun the expression of any feeling in 
love much deeper in its sentiment, or much more devoted in 
its passion, than would find sympathy with the men of the 
world for whom he principally wrote. If he ever did com- 
pose love-poems so earnest and glowing, I think it doubtful 
whether he would have prevailed on himself to publish them. 
To a poet who so consistently seeks to inculcate moderation 
in every passion and desire, there would have seemed some- 
thing not only inconsistent with his general repute as writer, 
but perhaps something offensive to his own sense of shame 
and the manliness of his nature, in that passionate devotion 
to the chanTis of a Cynthia to which Propertius refers the 
source of his inspiration and his loftiest pretension to the 
immortality of renown. And Horace is so far right, both as 
man and as artist, in the mode in which he celebrates the 
smiling goddess round whom hovers Mirth as well as Cupid j 
that, as man, one really would respect him less if any of 
those young ladies, who seem to have been too large-hearted 
to confine their affection to a single adorer, had inspired 
him with one of those rare passions which influence an entire 
existence. We should feel as much shame as compassion 
for any wise friend of ours whom Venus linked lastingly in 
her brazen yoke to a Lydia or a Pyrrha. And as an artist, 
Horace appears so far right in his mode of dealing with 
erotic subjects, that, despite all this alleged want of deep 
feehng and passionate devotion, Horace's love-poetry is still 
the most popular in the world — the most imitated, the most 



XXXIV THE ODES OF HORACE. 

quoted, the most remembered. The reason, perhaps, is, that 
most men have loved up to the extent that Horace admits 
the passion, and very few men have loved much beyond 
that limit. 

Notwithstanding the amazing pains taken by grave pro- 
fessors and erudite divines to ascertain the history of Horace's 
love-affairs — to tell us who and what those young beauties 
were — whom he loved first and whom he loved last — how 
many of them are to be reduced to a. select few, one being 
sung under different names lending their syllables to the 
same metrical convenience, so that Cinara, Lalage, Lydia, 
are one and the same person, &c. — the question remains in- 
soluble. Some scholars have had even the cold-blooded 
audacity to assert that, w4th the single exception of Cinara, 
and some strange sort of entanglement with the terrible 
sorceress to whom he gives the name of Canidia, all these 
Horatian beauties are myths and figments — as purely dreams 
as those out of the ivory gate — many of them, no doubt, 
translations, more or less free, from the Greek. 

The safest conjecture here, as in most cases of disputed 
judgment, lies between extremes. 

It is probable enough that a man like Horace — a man of 
wit and pleasure — thrown early into gay society, and of a 
very affectionate nature, as is evinced by the warmth of his 
friendships — should have been pretty often in what is com- 
monly called " love " during, say, thirty-nine years out of the 
fifty-seven in which he led a bachelor's life. And as few 
poets ever have been more subjective than Horace — ever 
received the aspect of life more decidedly through the 
medium of their own personal impressions — or more re- 
garded poetry as the vehicle of utterance for their opinions 
and doctrines, their likings and dislikings, their joys and their 
sorrows — so it may be reasonably presumed that in many of 
his love-verses he expresses or symbolises his own genuine 
state of feehng. Nor if in some of these there be detected 



INTRODUCTION. XXXV 

imitations from the Greek, does such imitation suffice to 
prove that the person addressed was imaginary, and the 
feehng uttered insincere? Nothing is more common 
among poets than the adaptation of ideas found elsewhere 
to their own individual circumstances and self-confessions. 
When Pope paraphrases Horace where Horace most exclu- 
sively personates himself, Pope still so paraphrases that the 
lines personate Pope and not Horace ; and one would know 
very little of the subjective character of Pope's mind and 
genius who could assert that he did not utter his own gen- 
uine feelings in describing, for instance, his early life and 
his early friendships, because the description was imitated 
from a Latin author. 

On the other hand, it is impossible to distinguish with 
any certainty what really does thus illustrate the actual ex- 
istence of Horace, and does utter the sounds of his own 
heart, from the purely objective essays of his genius (for, like 
all poets who have the dramatic faculty strongly developed, 
he is objective as well as subjective), and were the sportive 
exercises of art, and the airy embodiments of fancy. It is 
safest here to leave an acute reader to his own judgment ; 
and it is one of those matters in which acute readers will 
perhaps differ the most. 

Among the faults of Horace may also be mentioned his 
marked tendency to self- repetition, and especially to the 
repetition of what one of his most admirable but least en- 
thusiastic editors bluntly calls his "commonplaces:" viz., 
the shortness of life ; the wisdom of seizing the present 
hour ; the folly of anxious research into an unknown future ; 
the vanity of riches and of restless ambition ; the happiness 
of a golden mediocrity in fortune, and an equable mind in 
the vicissitudes of life. But these iterations of ideas, con- 
stituting the body of his ethics, if faulty — inasmuch as the 
ultima linea of his range may therein be too sharply defined — 
are the inseparable consequence of the most beautiful quali- 



XXXVl THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ties of his genius. They mark the consistent unity and the 
sincere convictions of the man — they show how much his 
favourite precepts are part and parcel of his whole mxOral 
and intellectual organisation. Whether conversing in his 
Satires, philosophising in his Epistles, giving free play to 
invention in his Odes — still he cannot help uttering and 
reuttering ideas the combination of which constitutes him- 
self. And as the general effect of these ideas is sooth- 
ing, so their prevalence in his verse has a charm of repose 
similar to the prevalence of green in the tints of nature : 
we greet the constant recurrence of the soft familiar colour 
wdth a sensation of pleasure even in its quiet monotony. 

Perhaps in most ™ters who have in a pre-eminent de- 
gree the gift of charm, there is, indeed, a certain fondness 
for some peculiar train of thought, the repetition of which 
gains in them the attraction of association. We should be 
disappointed, in reading such writers, if we did not find 
the ideas which characterise them, and for which we have 
learned to seek and to love them, coming up again and 
again like a refrain in music. It is so with some of our 
own poets — Goldsmith, Cowper, and Byron — who, alike in 
nothing else, are alike in the frequent recurrence of the 
ideas which constitute the characteristic colourings of their 
genius, and who, in that recurrence, deepen their spell over 
their readers. 

I believe, then, that the attributes thus imperfectly 
stated are among the principal constituent elements of 
Horace's indisputable charm, and of a popularity among 
men of various minds, which extends over a wdder circle 
than perhaps any other ancient poet commands^ Homer 
alone excepted. It is a popularity not diminished by the 
limits imposed on the admiration that accompanies it. Even 
those critics who deny him certain of the higher qualities 
of a lyrical poet, do not love him less cordially on account 
of the other qualities which they are pleased to accord to 



INTRODUCTION. XXXVll 

him. It is commonly enough said that, either from his own 
deficiencies or those of the Latin language, he falls far short 
of the Greek lyrical poets in fire, in passion, in elevation of 
style, in varied melodies of versification. Granted : but judg- 
ing by the scanty remains of those poets which time has 
spared, we find evidence of no one, — unless it be Alcaeus, 
and conjecturing what his genius might have been as a 
whole less by the fragments it has left than by Horace's 
occasional imitations, — no one who combines so many ex- 
cellences, be they great or small, as even a very qualified 
admirer must concede to Horace ; no one who blends so 
large a knowledge of the practical work-day world with so 
delicate a fancy, and so graceful a perception of the poetic 
aspects of human life j no one who has the same alert quick- 
ness of movement " from gay to grave, from lively to severe ;" 
no one who unites the same manly and high-spirited enforce- 
ment of hardy virtues, temperance and fortitude, devotion 
to friends and to the native land, with so pleasurable and 
genial a temperament ; no one who adorns so extensive an 
acquaintance with metropolitan civilisation by so many 
lovely pictures of rural enjoyment ; or so animates the de- 
scription of scenery by the introduction of human groups 
and images, instilling, as it were, into the body of outward 
nature, the heart and the thought of man. So that where 
his genius may fail in height as compared with Pindar, or in 
the intensity of sensuous passion as compared with Sappho, 
it compensates by the breadth to which it extends its sur- 
vey, and over which it diffuses its light and its warmth. 



Of all classical authors Horace is the one who has most 
attracted the emulation of editors and commentators. Stu- 
dents, indeed, have some reason to complain of the very 
attempts made by learning and" ingenuity to determine his 
text and interpret his meaning. No sooner have they accus- 



xxxvill THE ODES OF HORACE. 

tomed themselves to one edition than a new one appears to 
challenge the authority they had deferred to, and disturb 
the reading they had accepted. Paraphrases and transla- 
tions are still more numerous than editions and commen- 
taries. There is scarcely a man of letters who has not at 
one time or other versified or imitated some of the odes ; 
and scarcely a year passes without a new translation of them 
all. No doubt there is a charm in the proverbial difficulty 
of dealing with Horace's modes of expression ; but perhaps 
the true cause which invites translators to encounter that 
difficulty has been sufficiently intimated in the preceding 
remarks — viz., the comprehensive range of his sympathy 
with human beings. He touches so many sides of char- 
acter, that on one side or the other he is sure to attract 
us all, and we seek to clothe in his words some cherished 
feeling or sentiment of our own. Be that as it may, an 
unusual degree of indulgence has by tacit consent been 
accorded to new translations from Horace. Readers un- 
acquainted with the original are disposed to welcome every 
fresh attempt to make the Venusian Muse express herself 
in familiar English ; and Horatian scholars feel an interest 
in examining how each succeeding translator grapples with 
the difficulties of interpretation which have been, as «iany 
of them still are, matters of conjecture and dispute to com- 
mentators the most erudite, and critics the most acute. 

May a reasonable share of such general indulgence be 
vouchsafed to that variety in the mode of translation of 
which I now propose to hazard the experiment. 

I have long been of opinion that the adoption of other 
rhymeless measures than that to which we at present con- 
fine the designation of blank verse would be attended with 
especial advantage in translations from the classical poets, 
and, indeed, in poems founded upon Hellenic and Roman 
myths, and treated in the classical character and spirit. In 
that beHef I began many years ago these translations from 



INTRODUCTION. XXXIX 

Horace, and more recently submitted to the public the 
experiment of the metres employed in the ' Lost Tales of 
Miletus.' I will not lengthen this preface by any definition 
of the general rhythmical principles upon which, in my judg- 
ment, lyrical measures that, taking the form of strophe or 
stanza, dispense with rhyme, should be invented and framed. 
Should any writer be tempted hereafter to repeat and im- 
prove on my experiments, he will easily detect the laws I 
have laid down for myself, and adopt, modify, or reject 
them, according to his own idiosyncrasies of ear and taste. 

So far as these translations are concerned, it will be seen 
that I have shunned any attempt to transfer to our own 
language the exact form of the original metres. I have 
rather sought to construct measures in accordance with 
the character of English prosody, akin to the prevalent spirit 
of the original, and of compass sufiicient to allow a general 
adherence to the rule of translating line by line, or at least 
strophe by strophe, without needless amplification on the 
one hand, or harsh contraction on the other. 

With regard to the rhythmical form in which a sufficient 
analogy with the Latin metre can be best obtained by the 
English, there will always be a difference of taste and 
opinion. My own plan, when I originally commenced 
these translations, was in the first instance to attempt a 
close imitation of the ancient measure, the scansion being 
of course (as in English or German hexameters and pen- 
tameters) by accent, not quantity — and then to make such 
modifications of flow and cadence as seemed to me best 
to harmonise the rhythm to the English ear, while preserving 
as much as possible that which has been called '' the type " 
of the original. But as there are more ways than one by 
which such modifications may attain the objects required, 
so it soon appeared to me best to vary the modifications 
according as the prevalent spirit of the ode demanded 
lively and sportive, or serious and dignified, expression. 



xl THE ODES OF HORACE. 

In the Alcaic stanza I have thus employed two different 
forms of rhythm ; the one, which is of more frequent recur- 
rence, as in Ode ix. — the other, as in Odes xxxiv.-xxxv., 
Book I. ; either of which admits of slight occasional variations 
without disturbance to the general character or ''type" of 
the measure. 

For the Sapphic metre, in which Horace has composed 
more odes than in any other except the Alcaic, I have 
avoided, save in one or two of the shorter poems, any imita- 
tion of the chime rendered sufficiently familiar by Canning's 
" Knife-grinder," not only because, in the mind of an Eng- 
lish reader, it is associated with a popular burlesque, but 
chiefly because an English imitation of the Latin rhythm, 
with a due observance of the trochee in the first three lines 
of the stanza, has in itself an unpleasant and monotonous 
sing-song. In my version of the Sapphic I have chiefly 
employed two varieties of rhythm : for the statelier odes, our 
own recognised blank verse in the first three lines, usually, 
though not always, with a dissyllabic termination ; and, in 
the fourth line, a metre analogous in length and cadence to 
the fourth line of the original, though, of course, without 
any attempt at preserving the Latin quantity of dactyl and 
spondee. In fact, as Dr Kennedy has truly observed, the 
spondee is not attainable in our language, except by a very 
forced effort of pronunciation. That which passes current 
as an English spondee is really a trochee. For the lighter 
odes of the Sapphic metre, a more sportive or tripping mea- 
sure is adopted. 

I must leave my versions of the other metres which 
Horace has less frequently employed to speak for them- 
selves. 

In the Latin version, placed side by side with the Eng- 
lish, I have generally adopted the text of Orelli. The rare 
instances in which I have differed from it for that of another 
editor are stated in the notes. For the current punctuation 



INTRODUCTION. xli 

— which in Orelli, and indeed in Macleane, is so sparse as 
not unfrequently to render the sense obscure to those not 
famiHarly intimate with it — I am largely indebted to the 
admirable edition of Mr Yonge. The modes of spelling pre- 
ferred by Ritter and Mr MuDro as more faithful transcripts 
of the ancient MSS., involve questions of great interest to 
professional scholars, but are as yet too unfamiliar to the 
general reader for adoption in a text especially designed for 
his use, and annexed to the English translation for the con- 
venient facilities of reference and comparison. 

My objects in the task I have undertaken have compelled 
me to add in some degree the labour of a critic to those of 
a translator. The introductions prefixed and the notes 
appended to the several odes are designed not only to serve 
for readers unacquainted with the original, but to bring, in 
a terse and convenient form, before such students of Horace 
as may not have toiled through the many and often conflict- 
ing commentaries of the best editors, the opinions of eminent 
authorities upon difficult or disputed questions of interpreta- 
tion. In my notes will be seen the extent to which I am 
indebted not only to Dillenburger, Orelli, Ritter, but to our 
own recent English editors, Macleane and Yonge — and, on 
certain points of controverted interpretation, to Mr Munro's 
erudite and valuable introduction to the beautiful edition 
illustrated from antique gems, by Mr King. 

The majority of critics concur in the doctrine that all the 
Odes in Horace, differing in this respect from the Epodes, 
consist of stanzas in four lines, as the Alcaic and Sapphic 
do. This opinion has been ably controverted by Ritter. 
Munro decfines either to affirm or deny it. But conformably 
to the general opinion, I have treated, and so translated, the 
Odes as quatrains, with four exceptions, for which I subjoin 
my reasons. 

Odes i. Book L, xxx. Book III., and viii. Book IV., are 
in the same metre, and the only ones that are ; but Ode viii. 



xlii THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Book IV. consists of thirty-four lines, and cannot therefore 
be reduced to quatrain stanzas ; and the supposition that 
two verses required for such subdivision have been lost — no 
evidence of such loss appearing in the oldest MSS. or being 
intimated by the early commentators — is a hazardous basis 
on which to rest the theory that the poem must have been 
originally composed in quatrain. It is also to be observed 
that Ode i. Book I. so little adapts itself to the division of 
four-line stanzas with a suitable pause, that Mr Yonge fol- 
lows Stallbaum in printing the first two lines as prefatory 
to the rest, and the last two lines as the complement of the 
stanza. But it is a somewhat bold proceeding, for the sake 
of establishing an arbitrary system, thus to cut a stanza in 
half, placing one half at the beginning and the other half at 
the end of a poem; nor does the arrangement entirely effect 
the object aimed at, if, as Macleane and Munro contend, a 
full stop should be placed at the end of the fifth line — 
'^nobihs." Even the remaining ode in this metre— Ode 
XXX. Book III. — does not readily flow into quatrain, the 
pause not occurring at the fourth and eighth lines, but at the 
fifth and ninth. I have not, therefore, in my translation, 
divided these three odes into stanzas. Lastly, I have 
followed Dillenburger, Orelli, Macleane, Munro, in the 
arrangement of Ode xii. Book III. as a stanza of three 
lines, instead of adopting the quatrain arrangement of 
Kirchner, to be found in the excursus of Orelli, and 
favoured by Mr Yonge. 

The Secular Hymn I have printed in its proper chronolo- 
gical place, between Books III. and IV. 

I concur in the reasons which have led recent editors to 
reject the headings to the Latin version, which are found in 
the MSS. ; but I have given headings to the translation, for 
the convenience of reference which they afford to English 
readers. 

It remains for me only gratefully to acknowledge my 



INTRODUCTION. xliii 

obligations to the distinguished scholars who have permitted 
me to consult them in the course of this translation. Many 
years ago I submitted the earliest specimens of my attempts 
to my valued friend Dr Kennedy. His encouragement 
induced me to proceed with my undertaking, while his' 
advice and suggestions enabled me materially to improve it. 
With no less liberal a kindness another friend, the Rev. 
F. W. Farrar, has permitted me to encroach on his time, 
and profit by his taste and his learning. Much more could 
I say in gratitude, as to the services so generously rendered 
me by these eminent scholars, were it not for the fear 
that I might seem in so doing to shelter my defects 
and shortcomings under the authority of their names. It 
is enough for me to acknowledge that to them must be 
largely ascribed any merit which may be accorded to my 
labours, and that without their aid my faults would have 
been much more numerous and grave. 

Whatever else may be said of the work that I now dis- 
miss to its fate, let me hope that it will be at least con- 
sidered, by those best competent to judge, a conscientious 
and painstaking endeavour to give as faithful an interpreta- 
tion of the original as the difference of language will permit. 



This preliminary Introduction, with slight alterations, and 
a few specimens of the Translation, first appeared in ' Black- 
wood's Magazine' for April, May, July, and August 1868. 



THE ODES 



BOOK I.— ODE I. 

DEDICATORY ODE TO M^CENAS. 

It is doubtful whether this ode was composed as a dedi- 
catory preface to the first three books, or only to Book I. : 
the former supposition is more generally favoured. The 
poet condenses a rapid survey of the various objects of 
desire and ambition, commencing with the competition of 
the Olympic games, and passing from that reference to the 
Greeks, to the pursuits of his own countrymen in the emula- 
tion for power, the acquisition of riches, and so on, through 
the occupations and tastes of mankind in that busy world 
from which, at the close, he intimates that he himself is set 
apart. 

The punctuation and construction of the fifth and sixth 
lines of the ode have been a matter of much dispute. 
Maclean e, sanctioned by Mr George Long — and Munro, sup- 
ported "by the emphatic advocacy of Dr Kennedy" — adopt 
the reading which puts an end to the sentence at " nobilis," 
and joins on "Terrarum dominos evehit ad Deos " to what 
follows. By this reading, the lords of earth, or masters of the 
world, are neither (according to Orelli and most modern com- 
mentators) taken in apposition with " Deos," as in Ovid, Ep. 
ex Ponto, i. 9, 35, sq.— 

" Nam tua non alio coluit penetralia ritu 

Terrarum dominos quam colis ipse Deos ; " 

nor, according to elder commentators, approved by Ritter, is 
the term applied to regal or lordly competitors in the Greek 
games, such as Gelo, Hiero, &c. "Terrarum dominos" 



4 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Macleane understands to signify, with a tinge of irony, the 
Romans, styled by Virgil, ^n. i. 282, and Martial, xiv. 123, 
"Eomanos rerum dominos." Fortified in my own judg- 
ment by authorities of such eminence, I accept this inter- 
pretation. From these lords of earth Horace immediately 
passes on to select representatives of the two great orders 
of proprietors — the senatorial and the equestrian : a mem- 
ber of the first placing his happiness in the pursuit of the 
highest honours; a member of the second, which com- 
prised in its ranks the chiefs of commercial enterprise, in 
the success of gigantic speculations. 

"According to the usual punctuation," says Munro, 
*' verses 7-10 appear to me to have no construction at all; 
with mine, all is plain, ... In ancient Rome, too, as 

in 
Sprung from a race which mounts to kings, Maecenas, 

Shield and sweet ornament of life to me ; 
There are whose sovereign joy is dust Olympic 
Gathered in whirlwind '"^ by the car; the goal 
Shunned by hot wheels ; and the palm's noble trophy. — 

Up to the gods it bears the lords of earth, 
One — if the mob of Rome's electors fickle 

Through triple honours to exalt him vie ; 
One — if he harvest, stored in his own garner, 

Whate'er from Libyan threshing-floors is fanned. 
Treasures Attalict could not tempt the rustic, 

Delving with ready hoe paternal glebes, 
On seas Myrtoan, an affrighted sailor. 

To indent a furrow with the Cyprian keel. 

* " Collegisse juvat" To have gathered together or collected the 
scattered atoms of dust into a whirlwind — "pulvis collectus turbine," 
Sat. I. iv. 31. 

t A proverbial phrase for great riches. The rustic here meant is the 
small peasant proprietor, like those cultivators by spade-labour now so 
common in France. The "sarculum " was a lighter tool than a spade 



BOOK I. — ODE I. 5 

in modem England, high office and vast wealth, more than 
aught else, raised men to the sky." 

For the three odes in this measure I have employed in 
translation a metre consisting of our ordinary form of blank 
verse converted into a couplet by alternate terminations in 
a dissyllable and monosyllable ; and though that is a very 
simple, and may seem at first a very slight, modification of a 
famihar rhythm, it will be found to constitute, in the regular 
recurrence of alternated terminals, a marked difference from 
the chime of our epic line, and is yet equally in unison with 
the laws of our prosody. I have adopted the same metre in 
my version of the more important epodes, and in a few of 
the other odes. 

Carm. I. 

Maecenas atavis edite regibus 
O et praesidium et dulce decus meum. 
Sunt quos curriculo pulverem Olympicum 
Collegisse juvat,"^ metaque fervidis 
Evifata rotis, palmaque nobilis. 
Terrarum dominos evehit ad Deos, 
Hunc, si mobilium turba Quiritium 
Certat tergeminis tollere honoribus ; 
Ilium, si proprio condidit horreo 
Quidquid de Libycis verritur areis. 
Gaudentem patrios findere sarculo 
Agros, Attalicist condicionibus 
Nunquam dimoveas, ut trabe Cypria 
Myrtoum pavidus nauta secet mare. 

or mattock (with which Forcellini observes that Horace here con- 
founds it by synecdoche), and was used as a hoe for digging up weeds. 
The author of the article on "Agriculture" in Smith's 'Dictionary of 
Greek and Roman Antiquities' says that " it was an implement by which, 
after covering up the seed, the husbandman loosened the roots of the 
young blades in order that air and moisture might gain free access." 



THE ODES O^ HORACE. 

Seized by dismay, when with Icarian billows 

Wrestle the blasts of stormy Africus, 
The merchant sighs for ease and modest homestead 

Nestled in fields beside his native town ; 
Soon he refits his shattered barks ; contentment 

With humble means'^ is lore he cannot learn. 
Lo, one who scorns not beakers of old Massic, 

Nor lazy hours cut from the solid day, 
Now with limbs stretched beneath the verdant arbute, 

Now by soft well-head of nymph-hallowed streams. 
Camps delight many; clarion shrill, deep trumpet 
. Commingling stormy melodies ; and war, 
Hateful to mothers. His young bride forgetting, 

In wintry air the hunter stands at watch. 
If starts the deer in sight of his stanch beagles, 

Or bursts through close-knit toils the Marsian boar. 
Me, prize of learned brows, the wreathen ivy, 

Associates with the gods ; me woodlands cool 
And the light dance of nymphs with choral satyrs, 

Set from the many and their world apart ; 
If with no checked and hesitating utterance 

Euterpe lends her breath unto her flutes ; 
And for my touch the harp-strings heard in Lesbos 

If Polyhymnia scorns not to retune. 
But amid lyric bards if thou enrol me. 

With crest uplifted I shall strike the stars. 



*" "Indocilis pauperiem pati. " " Pauperies " does not here mean 
what is commonly understood by poverty, but, as Macleane expresses it, 
" a humble estate. " Macleane, indeed, states "that 'pauperies,' 'pau- 
pertas,' 'pauper,' are never by Horace taken to signify privation, or 
anything beyond a humble estate." This assertion is, however, too 
sweeping. In the lines (Epod. xvii. 47, 48), 

" Neque in sepulcris pauperum prudens anus 
Novendiales disslpare pulveres," 

" pauper" clearly means a person of the very poorest class. May not 



BOOK L — ODE I. 

Liictantem Icariis fluctibus Africum 
Mercator metuens, otium et oppidi 
Laudat rura sui ; mox reficit rates 
Quassas, indocilis pauperiem'pati.* 
Est qui nee veteris pocula Massici, 
Nee partem solido demere de die 
Spernit, nunc viridi membra sub arbuto 
Stratus, nunc ad aquge lene caput sacrae. 
Multos castra juvant, et lituo tubae 
Permixtus sonitus, bellaque matribus 
Detestata. Manet sub Jove frigido 
Venator, tenerae conjugis immemor, 
Seu visa est catulis cerva fidelibus, 
Seu rupit teretes Marsus aper plagas. 
Me doctarum hederse praemia frontium 
Dis miscent superis ; me gelidum nemus 
Nympharumque leves cum Satyris chori 
Secernunt populo, si neque tibias 
Euterpe cohibet, nee Polyhymnia 
Lesboum refugit tendere barbiton. 
Quod si me lyricis vatibus inseres, 
Sublimi feriam sidera vertice. 



the same be said of "Pauperum tabernas" in contradistinction to "Re- 
gum turres"? Lib. I. Od. iv. 13, 14. The words "pauper," "pau- 
peries," "paupertas," have, indeed, some of the elastic sense of our 
own Poor Man, or Poverty, which may imply only comparatively re- 
stricted means, or sometimes absolute want. The English language 
has expressions denoting the gradations of stinted circumstances cor- 
respondent to those in the Latin. The English has poverty, penury, 
destitution : the Latin, paupertas, inopia, egestas. So also the Greek 
language has irevia, honourable poverty ; TTTcoxem, discreditable poverty ; 
^udeia, destitution. 



8 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Excursus. 
" Me doctarum hederse praemia frontium," 

Wolff, Hare, Tate, and some other commentators, would 
substitute " Te " for " Me " — applying the line to Maecenas, 
" Thee the ivy — the prize of learned brows — associates with 
gods above ; Me the cool woods, &c., set apart from the com- 
mon crowd." This reading is rejected by the highest critical 
authorities, including Orelli and Macleane ; but it appears 
in itself entitled to more respect than is shown by the latter. 
For there is some force in the remark, that in referring to 
the various tastes and characteristics of men, Horace would 
scarcely avoid all complimentary reference to Maecenas him- 
self; and there is yet more force in another remark that, if 
Horace says that the ivy wreath associates him with the 
higher or celestial gods, there is a certain bathos, if not con- 
tradiction, in immediately afterwards saying that his tastes 
associate him with the inferior or terrestrial deities — /. e., 
nymphs and satyrs. It is said in vindication of ^' Me " in- 
stead of " Te," that " doctus " is a word very appropriate to 
poets; that the ivy, sacred to Bacchus, was the fit and 
usual garland for a lyric poet ; and that Horace could never 
stoop to the absurd flattery of insinuating that Maecenas was 
a greater poet than himself But, in answer to all this, it 
may be urged that Horace elsewhere especially applies the 
word " doctus " to Maecenas ; in Lib. III. Od. viii. line 4, — 

'* Docte sermones utriusque linguae ; " 

and again, more emphatically, Epist. xix, line i, — 
"Prisco si credis, Maecenas docte, Cratino." 

And though the ivy was appropriate to poets, it was not 
appropriate to poets alone. Horace (Lib. I. Epist. iii., 
addressed to Julius Florus) speaks of it as the reward of 



BOOK I.— ODE I. 9 

excellence in forensic eloquence or jurisprudence as well as 
of song : — 

" Seu linguam causis acuis seu civica jura, 
Respondere paras seu condis amabile carmen, 
Prima feres hedercz yxoXxizxi, prceniia.^'' 

And if the ivy crown may be won by pleading causes or 
giving advice to clients, it can be no inappropriate reward 
to the brows of a statesman so accomplished as Maecenas. 
Thus, I think, there is much to be said in favour of the 
construction — "Thee, Maecenas, the ivy wreath — prize of 
learned or skilled brows — associates with the higher gods 
{i. e., with those who watch over states and empires) ; me, 
the love of rural leisure and the dreams that it begets set 
apart from the crowd." On the other side, Ritter has the 
best vindication I have seen of the alleged contradiction or 
bathos in the Poet's boasted association, first, with the higher 
gods, and next, with the inferior deities. According to him, 
Horace is speaking of two kinds of lyric poetry — the lofty 
and the sportive. The first, symbolised by the ivy, associ- 
ates him with gods in heaven ; the second, connecting him 
with the pastimes of nymphs and satyrs, separates him from 
the popular pursuits of men. For the first, he trusts to the 
aid of Polyhymnia, presiding over the Lesbian lyre (of 
Alcaeus) j for the second, to the livelier inspiration of 
Euterpe. 



10 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE 11. 

TO CESAR. 

The exact date of this ode has been matter of controversy, 
but most recent authorities concur in assigning it to about 
A.U.C. 725, after the taking of Alexandria, and at the height 
of Augustus's popularity on his return to Rome.. Ritter 
argues strongly in favour of the later date, a.u.c. 732. The 
prodigies described in the earlier verses are those which fol- 
lowed the death of Julius Caesar, a.u.c. 710, and Horace 
therefore, at the opening of the poem, transports himself in 
imagination to that time. — See OrelH's excursus, Macleane's 
introduction, and Ritter's prooemium. On the merit of the 
ode itself opinion differs. By some it is highly praised for its 
imagery, the delicacy with which it flatters Augustus, and the 
humane art with which it insinuates that his noblest, revenge 

for 

Now of dire hail and snow enough the Sire 

Has launched on earth, and with a red right hand 

Smiting the sacred Capitolian heights * 
Startled the City, 

Startled the nations, lest the awful age 
Of Pyrrha, wailing portents new, return, 
When Proteus up to visit mountain-peaks 
Drove his whole sea-flock, 

When fishes meshed in topmost boughs of elms 
Floundered amidst the doves' familiar haunts, 
And deer, through plains t above the old plains heapen, 
Swam panic-stricken. 

* " Sacras — arces," the sacred buildings on the Capitoline Hill. . 
t "Et superjecto pavidae natarunt 
^quore damas." 
'*^quor" is a plain or level surface, whether of land or sea. The 
former appears to have been its original and simple meaning, though the 



BOOK I.— ODE 11. II 

for his uncle's murder is in becoming the protector and father 
of his people. Against this praise it may be said, not without 
reason, that the poem has blemishes of a kind from which 
Horace is free in odes of similar importance ; that there is 
something forced and artificial in the kind of humour admitted 
into the description of Pyrrha's flood ; that the idea of the 
uxorious River bursting his banks out of complaisance to the 
complaints of his wife is little better than a frigid conceit; and 
that the " extravaganza " contained in the transfiguration of 
Mercury into the earthly form of Augustus, fails in that man- 
liness of genuine enthusiasm with which Horace celebrates 
Augustus in Odes B. III. and IV. Whatever weight may be 
attached to these objections, they suffice to render the ode 
one of the most difficult to translate so as to impress an 
English reader with some sense of the beauties ascribed to 
it by its admirers. . 

Carm. II. 
Jam satis terris nivis atque dirse 
Grandinis misit Pater, et rubente 
Dextera sacras jaculatus arces,'' 
Terruit Urbem, 

Terruit gentes, grave ne rediret 
Sseculum PyiThae, nova monstra questae, 
Omne cum Proteus pecus egit altos 
Visere montes, 

Piscium et summa genus haesit ulmo, 
Nota quae sedes fuerat columbis, 
Et superjecto pavidas natarunt 
^quoret damae. 

poets applied it afterwards to the latter (Cicero, Acad. 2). Though the 
word here implies "water," the point w^ould be lost in so translating 
it. There would be no prodigy in deer swimming through water — 
the prodigy is in their swimming through plains cast over those on 
which they had been accustomed to range. 



12 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

We have seen the tawny Tiber, with fierce waves i 

Wrenched violent back from vents in Tuscan seas, \ 

March on to Numa's hall and Vesta's shrine,"' ' 
Menacing downfall ; 

Vaunting himself the avenger of the wrong 

By Ilia too importunately urged. 

The uxorious River leftward burst his banks, 

Braving Jove's anger. t ' 

Thinned by parental crime, the younger race 
Shall hear how citizens made sharp the steel 
By which should rather have been slain the Mede : \ 

Hear — of what battles ! 

Who is the god this people shall invoke ' 

To save a realm that rushes to its fall ? \ 

By what new prayer shall sacred virgins tire j 

Vesta to hearken ? \ 

To whom shall Jove assign the part of guilt's j 

Blest expiator? Come, at last, we pray, j 

With shoulder brightening through the stole of cloud, j 

Augur Apollo ! j 

Or com'st thou rather, Eryx^ laughing queen. 

Ringed by the hovering play of Mirth and Love ; \ 

Or satiate with, alas, too lengthened sport, | 

Thou, Parent War-god, i 



* The palace of Numa adjoined the temple of Vesta at the foot of 
Mount Palatme. Fea says that the Church of Sta Maria Liberatrice 
occupies this site. 

+ Ilia, mother of Romulus, was, according to legend, thrown into the 
Tiber by Amulius — hence the fable that she became wife to the god of 
that river. She complains to her husband of the murder of Julius Csesar, 
to whom she claims affinity. The special reason for Jove's displeasure 



BOOK I. — ODE II. 13 

Vidimus flavum Tiberim, retortis 
Litore Etmsco violenter undis, 
Ire dejectum monumenta Regis 
Templaque Vestae.''^ 

Iliae dum se nimium querenti 
Jactat ultorem, vagus et sinistra 
Labitur ripa, Jove non probante, u- 
xorius amnis.t 

Audiet cives acuisse ferrum, 
Quo graves Persse melius perirent ; / 
Audiet pugnas, vitia-^>a*©etOTir" / 

Rara, juventus. / 

Quem vocet Divum populus ruentis 
Imperi rebus ? prece qua fatigent 
Virgines sanctae minus audientem 
Carmina Vestam ? 

Cui dabit partes scelus expiandi 
Juppiter ? Tandem venias precamur, 
Nube candentes humeros amictus, 
Augur Apollo ; 

Sive tu mavis, Erycina ridens, 
Quam Jocus circum volat et Cupido ; 
Sive neglectum genus et nepotes 
Respicis, auctor, 



at the river-god's incursion on the left bank is variously conjectured : it 
may be either that on that side he threatened the temple of Jove him- 
self, or that Jove, as supreme guardian of all temples and of Rome 
itself, resented the outbreak as an offence to himself, or, as Macleane 
interprets it, " He disapproved the presumption of the river-god, be- 
cause he had reserved the task of expiation for other hands and happier 



14 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Joying in battle- clang and glancing helms 
And the grim aspect of the horseless Moor,* 
Fixing his death-scowl on the gory foe. 
Come, if regarding 

Thine own neglected race, thine offspring, come ! 
Or thou, mild Maia's winged son, transformed 
To mortal youth,t submitting to be called 
Caesar's avenger ; 

Stay thy return to heaven : long tarry here 
Well pleased to be this Roman people's guest, 
Nor with our vices wroth, untimely soar, ^ 
Rapt by the whirlwind. 

Here rather in grand triumphs take glad rites. 
Here love the name of Father and of Prince, 
No more unpunished let the Parthian ride. 
Thou our chief — Caesar. J 



* All recent editors have "Mauri peditis." Munro, though retain- 
ing that reading in his text, is " not convinced that ' Marsi peditis ' is 
not far finer and more appropriate." 

+ Mercury in the form of Augustus. Orelli dryly observes that Augustus 
w^as forty years old at the date vv^hen he is here called "juvenem." No 
doubt "juvenis" and " adolescens" were v^^ords descriptive of any age 
between "pueritia" and " senectus," and Cicero called himself "adoles- 
cens" at the age of forty-four, when he crushed the conspiracy of Cati- 
line ; but still a ' 'juvenis" of forty, or even of thirty years old, would have 
little resemblance to the popular effigies of the smooth-faced son of Maia 
(Mercury) ; and considering the whole space of time which this poem 
reviews and condenses, starting from the death of Julius Ccesar, is it 
not probable that Horace here applies the word "juvenis" to August- 
us in reference to the age in which he first announced himself as *' Csesaris 
ultor " (Caesar's avenger), and in order to achieve that name and fulfil 
that object descended from his celestial rank as Mercury, or (to define 
more clearly the mythical functions of Mercury) as the direct messenger 
from Jove to man ? Augustus, then, was a youth in every sense of the 
word. In fact he was barely twenty when he declared it to be his resolve 
and his mission to avenge the death of his uncle. At that age, judging 



BOOK I. — ODE II. 15 

Heu ! nimis longo satiate ludo, 
Quem juvat clamor galeseque leves, 
Acer et Mauri peditis"^ cruentum 
Voltus in hostem ; 

Sive mutatat juvenem figura 
Ales in terris imitaris, alm^ 
Filius Maiae, patiens vocari 
Caesaris ultor : 

Serus in caelum redeas, diuque 
Lastus intersis populo Quirini, 
Neve te nostris vitiis iniquum 
Ocior aura 

Tollat ; hie magnos potius triumphos, 
Hie ames dici Pater atque Princeps, 
Neu sinas Medos equitare inultos, 
Te duce, Caesar. J 



by his effigies in gems, the resemblance of the young Octavius to the 
face of Mercury in the statues is sufficiently striking to have created 
general remark, and to save from extravagant flattery the lines in the 
ode. For of the two faces that of the young Octavius is of a higher 
and more godlike type of beauty than appears in any extant statue of 
Mercury. 

X " The way in which he introduces the name of Csesar unexpectedly 
at the end, has always appeared to me an instance of consummate 
art." — Macleane. 



1 6 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE III. 

ON VIRGIL'S VOYAGE TO ATHENS. 

There is a well-known dispute as to the date and the 
occasion of this ode, and it has been even called in ques- 
tion whether the Virgil addressed were the poet. It is, no 
doubt, difficult to reconcile the received chronology of the 
publication of the first three books of Odes with the sup- 
position 

So may the goddess who rules over Cyprus, 
So may the brothers of Helen, bright stars, 

So may the Father of Winds, while he fetters 
All, save lapyx, the Breeze of the West, 

Speed thee, O Ship, as I pray thee to render * 
Virgil, a debt duly lent to thy charge. 

Whole and intact on the Attican borders, 
Faithfully guarding the half of my soul. 

Oak and brass triple encircled his bosom. 

Who first to fierce ocean consigned a frail raft, 

Fearing not Africus, when, in wild battle, 

Headlong he charges the blasts of the North ; 

Fearing no gloom in the face of the Hyads ; 

Fearing no rage of mad Notus, than whom. 
Never a despot more absolute wieldeth 

Hadria, to rouse her or lull at his will. 



* I side with Dillenburger, Ritter, Munro, and Macleane in rejecting 
the punctuation of Orelli, who places a comma before " precor," putting 
the word in parenthesis, for the reason thus ably stated in the following 
note, for which I am indebted to a friend, than whom there is no higher 
authority in critical scholarship : ' * It is not commonly observed, but 



BOOK L— ODE III. 17 

position that this ode was addressed to Virgil the poet, on 
the occasion of the voyage to Athens, from which he only 
returned to die : but there is no reason why Virgil should 
not have made or contemplated such a voyage before the 
last one; and Macleane, here agreeing with Dillenburger, is 
"inclined to think such must have been the case." — See 
his introduction to this ode. 

Carm. III. 

Sic te Diva potens Cypri, 
Sic fratres Helenae, lucida sidera, 

Ventorumque regat pater 
Obstrictis aliis praeter lapyga, 

Navis, quae tibi creditum 
Debes Virgilium finibus Atticis 

Reddas incolumem precor,"' 
Et serves animae dimidium me^. 

lUi robur et aes triplex 
Circa pectus erat, qui fragilem tnici 

Commisit pelago rat em 
Primus, nee timuit praecipitem Africum 

Decertantem Aquilonibus, 
Nee tristes Hyadas, nee rabiem Noti, 

Quo non arbiter Hadri^e 
Major, toUere seu ponere vult freta. 



certainly true, that the 2d pars. pres. subj. (reddas), is never used as a 
mere imperative, = 'redde.' It may be used /r(?(:«/zz/^/;/ in addressing 
a deity, a superior (or in politeness), as * serves ' in Ode xxxv. 1. 29. 
Where it is used with ' precor,' the verb is not in parenthesis, but dis- 
tinctly governs 'reddas,' ' I pray you to render.' There should there- 
fore be no comma between them ; and this view shows * precor ' to be 
the true apodosis of the passage." 

B 



< 
1 8 THE ODES OF HORACE. j 

What the approach by which Death could have daunted 
Him who with eyelids unmoistened beheld | 

Monster forms gliding and mountain waves swelling, \ 

And the grim Thunder-Crags dismally famed? j 

Vainly by wastes of dissociable ocean 

Providence severed the lands from the lands ■ 

If the plains not to be touched by our footfall : 

Be, yet, profanely o'er-leapt by our rafts. j 

Rushes man's race through the evils forbidden. 
Lawlessly bold to brave all things and bear : 

Lawlessly bold did the son of the Titan 

Bring to the nations fire won through a fraud. 

Fire stolen thus from the Dome Empyrean, 
Meagre Decay swooped at once on the earth. 

Leagued with a new-levied army of fevers — 
Death, until then the slow-comer, far-off, 

Hurried his stride, and stood facing his victim ; 

Daedalus, upward, the void realms of air 
Sounded on wings that to man are not given ; 

Down, burst the labour Herculean through hell. 

Nought is too high for the daring of mortals ; 

Heaven's very self in our folly we storm. 
Never is Jove, through our guilty aspiring. 

Suffered to lay down the bolt we provoke. 



BOOK I. — ODE III. 



19 



Quern Mortis tirnuit gradum, 
Qui siccis oculis monstra natantia, 

Qui vidit mare turgidum et 
Infames scopulos Acroceraunia ? 

Nequicquam Deus abscidit 
Prudens Oceano dissociabili 
Terras, si tamen impias 

Xon tangenda rates transiliunt vada. 

Audax omnia perpeti 
Gens humana ruit per vetitum nefas : 

Audax lapeti genus 
Ignem fraude mala gentibus intulit. 

Post ignem setheria domo 
Subductum, Macies et nova Febriura 

Terris incubuit cohors, 
Semotique prius tarda necessitas 

Leti corripuit gradum. 
Expertus vacuum D^dalus aera 

Pennis non homini datis ; 
Perrupit Acheronta Herculeus labor. 



Nil mortalibus ardui est ; 
Caelum ipsum petimus stultitia, neque 
Per nostrum patimur scelus 

Iracunda Jovem ponere fulmina. 



20 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE IV. 

TO LUCIUS SESTIUS. 

The Lucius Sestius here addressed was the son of the 
Sestius or Sextius defended by Cicero in an oration still 

extant. 

Keen winter melts in glad return of spring and soft Favonius ; 

And the dry keels the rollers seaward draw ; 
No more the pens allure the flock, no more the hearth the 
ploughman ; 

Nor glint the meadows white with rime-frost hoar — 

Beneath the overhanging moon, now Venus leads her dances, 
And comely Graces, linked with jocund Nymphs, 

Shake with alternate foot the earth, while ardent Vulcan kindles 
The awful forge in which the Cyclops toils. '"^ 

Now well becomes anointed brows to wreathe with ver- 
dant myrtle, 

Or such rath flowers as swards, relaxing, free ; 
And well becomes the votive lamb, or kid if more it please him. 

Offered to Faunus amid shadowy groves. 

But all tliQ while, with equal step, pale Death strides on 
unpausing, 
Knocks at the lowly shed and regal tower. 
Long hopes commenced we must not add to life's brief sum, 
glad Sestius; 
Even now press on thee Night and mythic ghosts. 

And Pluto's meagre hall, which gained, the wine-king's reign 
is over — 
No more the die allots the frolic crown, t 



* Venus dances — Vulcan toils : i.e., in spring man reawakens both 
to pleasure and labour. 

+ The Romans chose by cast of the die the symposiarch or king of 
the feast. 



BOOK L— ODE IV. 21 

extant. Lucius served under Brutus in Macedonia, and 
after his chieftain's death continued to honour his memory 
and preserve his images. He did not on that account 
incur the displeasure of Augustus, who made him Consul 
Suffectus in his own place, B.C. 23. 

There is no other ode in this metre, which has its name 
(Archilochian) from Archilochus of Paros. The difference 
in rhythm between the first and second verse of the strophe 
is remarkable, and suggests the idea of being chanted by 
two voices in alternate lines. 

Carm. IV. 

Solvitur acris hiems grata vice veris et Favoni, 

Trahuntque siccas machinse carinas. 
Ac neque jam stabulis gaudet pecus, aut arator igni ; 

Nee prata canis albicant pruinis. 

Jam Cytherea choros ducit Venus, imminente Luna, 
Junctaeque Nymphis Gratise decentes 

Alterno terram quatiunt pede, dum graves Cyclopum 
Vulcanus ardens urit officinas.* 

Nunc decet aut viridi nitidum caput impedire myrto, 

Aut flore, terrae quem ferunt solutas. 
Nunc et in umbrosis Fauno decet immolare lucis, 

Seu poscat agna, sive malit hasdo. 

Pallida Mors aequo pulsat pede pauperum tabernas 

Regumque turres. O beate Sesti, 
Vitae summa brevis spem nos vetat inchoare longam. 

Jam te premet nox, fabulaeque Manes, 

Et domus exilis Plutonia : quo simul mearis. 

Nee regnavini sortiere talis t 
Nee tenerum Lycidan mirabere, quo calet juventus 

Nunc omnis, et mox virgines tepebunt. 



22 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE V. 

TO PYRRHA. 

I cannot presume to attempt any rhymeless version of 
this ode in juxtaposition with Milton's famous translation, 
which I therefore annex. " Any resemblance between the 

metre 
What slender youth, bedewed with liquid odours,'^ 
Courts thee on roses in some pleasant cave,t 
Pyrrha ? for whom bind'st thou 
In wreaths thy golden hair, 
Plain in thy neatness ? O, how oft shall he 
On faith and changed gods complain, and seas 
Rough with black winds, and storms 
Unwonted shall admire ! 
Who now enjoys thee credulous, all gold, 
Who always vacant, always amiable 
Hopes thee, of flattering gales 
Unmindful. Hapless they 
T' whom thou untried seem'st fair ! Me, in my vowed 
Picture, the sacred wall declares t' have hung 
My dank and dropping weeds 
To the stern god of sea. X 

* The reader will observe that the first Ime is the only one in the 
translation which ends with a dissyllable. Whether Milton makes this 
variation of the rhythm he selects through oversight or intention, the 
reader can conjecture for himself. Probably Milton regai'ded the two 
first lines of each strophe simply as heroic blank verse, in which the 
termination by a monosyllable or dissyllable is optional. 

+ " Grato, Pyrrha, sub antro." "Some pleasant cave" appears 
scarcely to give the sense of the original. "Antrum " means the grotto 
attached to the houses of the luxurious, and in which was placed a statue 
of Venus. Grottoes ai-e still in use among the richer Italians, and it is not 
some cave to which Horace alludes, but with a certain tenderness of re- 
proach to l/ie grotto in which Pyrrha had been accustomed to receive him. 

X " Potenti — maris deo" Milton translates "the stern god of sea,'' 



BOOK I. — ODE V. 23 

metre he selects and that of the original depends," as Mr 
Conington observes, " rather on the length of the respective 
lines than on any similarity in the cadences," and his rhythm 
is perhaps somewhat too cramped to convey the lyrical spirit 
in lighter and livelier odes of the same measure in the ori- 
ginal ; — even in this translation such contractions as 

" T' whom thou untried seem'st fair ! Me, in my vowed 
Picture, the sacred wall declares t' have hung " — 

are not without a certain harshness. But all minor defects 
are amply compensated by the masterly closeness and ele- 
gance of the general version. The metre is ranked with the 
Asclepiadeans, and is repeated. Book I. 14, 21, 23 ; III. 7, 
13 ; IV. 13. 

Carm. V. 

Quis multa gracilis te puer in rosa ^" 
Perfusup liquidis urget odoribus, 
Grato, Pyrrha, sub antro ? + 
Cui flavam religas comam. 

Simplex munditiis ? Heu ! quoties fidem 
Mutatosque deos flebit, et aspera 
Nigris asquora ventis 
Emirabitur insolens, 

Qui nunc te fruitur credulus aurea ; 
Qui semper vacuam, semper amabilem 
Sperat nescius aurae 

Fallacis. Miseri, quibus 

Intentata nites ! Me tabula sacer 
Votiva paries indicat uvida 
Suspendisse potenti J 
Vestimenta maris Deo. 



not observing that "potens" governs "maris" as "potens Cypri. " — 
Macleane. 



24 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE VI. 

TO M. VIPSANIUS AGRIPPA. 

. No public man among the partisans of Augustus is more 
remarkable for the union of extraordinary talents with ex- 
traordinary fortune than the Vipsanius Agrippa to whom 
this ode is addressed. Sprung from a very obscure fam- 
ily, he might have failed in obtaining a fair career for his 
powers but for the accident of being a fellow-student with 
the young Octavius at Apollonia. He thus, at the age of 
twenty, became one of the most intimate associates, and 
one of the most influential advisers, of the future emperor 
of the world. While he was yet in youth he had achieved 
the highest distinctions, and secured the most eminent sta- 
tion. He had passed through the office of pr^tor and con- 
sul, and established, by a series of brilliant successes, the 
fame of a great general. As a naval commander he became 
yet more illustriously distinguished. He constructed the 
Roman navy ; defeated Sextus Pompeius, then master of the 
sea; commanded the fleet against M. Antony; and the 
victory at Actium was mainly owing to his skill. It was 
soon after that last victory that this ode is supposed to 
have been written. All the honours Augustus could confer 
were heaped on him ; the emperor united him to his own 
family, first by a marriage with his niece Marcella, subse- 
quently, yet more closely, by marriage with his daughter 
Julia. Fortune never deserted Agrippa to the close of his 
life at the age of fifty-one. His character seems to have been a 
union of qualities rarely found together, — sagacity of design, 

rapidity 

'Tis by Varius that Song, borne on pinions Homeric, 
Shall exalt thy renown as the valiant and victor, 
Whatsoe'er the bold soldier by land or by ocean 
With thee for his leader achieved. 



BOOK I.— ODE VI. 25 

rapidity of action, a brilliant genius in construction, devoted 
to practical purposes. When he was forming a fleet he 
turned the Lucrine Lake into a harbour for a school to the 
mariners by whom he afterwards defeated the tried sailors 
of Sextus Pompeius. As «dile his first care was to supply 
Rom^ with water, restoring the Appian, Marcian, and 
Anienian aqueducts, and building a new one fifteen miles long 
from the Tepula to Rome. With this utility of purpose he 
combined great magnificence in taste, adorning the city with 
public buildings and statues by the ablest artists he could find. 
All these daring and splendid qualities were accompanied 
by a modesty or a prudence which preserved the affection 
of the people and avoided all chance of exciting the jealousy 
of Augustus. He twice refused a trium.ph. 

The reader will observe with what ease Horace avoids all 
servility in the brief homage he delicately renders to Agrippa, 
and the playfulness of the concluding stanza would seem to 
intimate a certain familiarity of intercourse, or at all events 
that there was nothing in the temper of Agrippa, two years 
younger than himself, so austere as to be shocked by the 
poet's favourite subjects for song. Of the poems of Varius, 
to whose muse Horace refers the due celebration of Agrippa's 
deeds, only a few fragmentary lines have been preserved. 
Among these is the description of a hound, which is vigorous 
and striking. The fragment has been imitated by Virgil, 
whom he preceded as an epic poet. His tragedy of ' Thy- 
estes' seems to have survived in repute his epics, since 
Quintilian does not mention those, while he accords to 
'Thyestes' the high praise of saying "that it might have 
stood comparison with any of the Greek dramatic master- 
pieces." 

Carm. VI. 

Scriberis Vario fortis et hostium 
Victor Maeonii carm.inis alite, 
Quam rem cunque ferox navibus aut equis 
Miles, te duce, gesserit : 



26 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Themes so lofty we slight ones attempt not, Agrippa, 
Nor the terrible wrath of unyielding Pelides, 
Nor the fell house of Pelops, nor seas which Ulysses, 
The double-tongued hero, explored. 

While the Muse that presides over lute-strings unwarlike, 
And my own sense of shame would forbid me to lessen, 
By the inborn defect of a genius unequal, 
The glories of Caesar and thee. 

Who can worthily sing Mars in adamant tunic. 
Or Merion all grim with the dust-cloud of Ilion, 
Or Tydides, when, thanks to the favour of Pallas, 
He stood forth a match for the gods ? 

We of feasts, we of battles, on youths rashly daring 
Waged by maids armed with nails too well pared for 

much slaughter. 
Sing, devoid of love's flame ; or, if somewhat it scorch us. 
Still wont to make light of the pain. 



BOOK I. — ODE VI. 27 

Nos, Agrippa, neque haec dicere, nee gravem 
Pelidae stomachum cedere nescii, 
Nee cursus duplieis per mare Ulixei, 
Nee saevam Pelopis domum 

Conamur, tenues grandia : dum pudor 
Imbellisque lyr^ Musa potens vetat 
Laudes egregii Caesaris et tuas 
Culpa deterere ingeni. 

Quis Mart em tunica teetum adamantina 
Digne scripserit ? aut pulvere Troieo 
Nigrum Merionen, aut ope Palladis 
Tydiden superis parem ? 

Nos eonvivia, nos proelia virginum 

Sectis in juvenes unguibus acrium 

Cantamus, vaeui, sive quid urimur, 

Non praeter solitum leves. 



28 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE VII. 

TO PLANCUS. 

This ode is generally supposed to be addressed to L. 
Munatius Plancus, than whom those versatile times did 
not engender a more selfish renegade or a more ungrateful 
traitor. Estre, loath to grant that Horace condescended 
to immortalise this person (who, however, contrived to make 
himself important to all parties, and died safe, wealthy, and 
honoured at least by Augustus, who even conferred upon 

him 

Other bards shall extol brilliant Rhodes, Ephesus, or Mytilene, 

Or, queen of two seas, stately Corinth, 
Embattled Thebes, famous through Bacchus, Delphi as 
famed through Apollo, 

Or Thessaly's beautiful Tempe. 

Some are whose sole task is to laud the city of Pallas the 
spotless 
Through the length of a measureless Epic,'"' 
Upon every side plucking a leaf to garland their brows with 
the olive; 
And many, in honour of Juno, 

Tell of Argos, the breeder of steeds, and the rich stores of 
Mycense ; 

But me more have stricken with rapture 
Than patient Laconia's defiles, than fertile Larissa's expanses 

The grot of Albunea t resounding. 

The Anio's precipitous rush, the woodlands and orchards of 
Tibur, 
All dewy with quick winding waters. 

* "Carmine perpetuo celebrare." I adopt the interpretation of 
Orelli, Macleane, and Yonge — a continuous poem, like an epic, culling 



BOOK L— ODE VII. 29 

him the censorship, B.C. 27), thinks that it was some other 
Plancus, possibly his son, designated as Munatius, Lib. I. Ep. 
iii. V. 31. Horace, however, in this ode does not ascribe 
any virtues to the person addressed at variance with the 
general character of the successful renegade, and only bids 
him not take grief much to heart, but enjoy himself as much 
as he could, whether in the camp or at his villa — an admoni- 
tion which he was not likely to disregard. The measure of 
the ode takes its name from Alcman. It consists of a com- 
plete hexameter alternated with a verse made up of the last 
four feet of a hexameter. Horace only employs this metre 
twice again. Book I. Ode xxviii., and Epode xii. 

Carm. VII. 

Laudabunt alii claram Rhodon, aut Mytilenen, 

Aut Epheson, bimarisve Corinthi 
Moenia, vel Baccho Thebas, vel Apolline Delphos 

Insignes, aut Thessala Tempe. 

Sunt, quibus unum opus est, intactae Palladis urbem 

Carmine perpetuo'^ celebrare, et 
Undique decerptam fronti prseponere olivam. 
-Plurimus in Junonis honorem, 

Aptum dicet equis Argos ditesque Mycenas. 

Me nee tam patiens Lacedaemon, 
Nee tam Larissse percussit campus opimae, 

Quam domus Albunese t resonantis, 

Et pragceps Anio, ac Tiburni lucus et uda 
Mobilibus pomaria rivis. 



all the associations and myths connected with Athens, and fomied into 
a whole like Ovid's Metamorphoses. 

+ Albunea, the Sibyl, who gave her name to a grove and fountain, 
and apparently to a grotto at Tibur. 



30 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

As the white southern wind often clears clouds from a sky 
at its darkest, 
Giving birth to no rain that is lasting, 

So, Plancus, let those weary hours, when life seems but 
labour and sorrow. 
Be lulled to their end in the wine-cup ; 
Or whether camps blazing with banners hold thee, or haply 
hereafter 
The shades of thine own tranquil Tibur. 

When from Salamis and from his sire, Teucer was passing to 
exile, 
'Tis said that he crowned with the poplar^ 
Brows first besprinkled with drops from the strength-giving 
boon of Lyaeus, 
To friends as they sorrowed thus speaking : 

" Go WE wheresoever a fate more kind than the heart of a 
parent 
May bear us, associates and comrades ; 
Despair of nought, Teucer your chief — of nought under aus- 
pice of Teucer, 
Unerring Apollo predicts us 

" A Salamis built on new soil, which Fame shall confound 
with the lost one ; t 
Brave friends who have borne with me often 
Worse things as men, let the wine chase to-day every care 
from the bosom. 
To-morrow — again the great Sea Plains." 



* Emblematic of courage and adventure. The poplar was consecrated 
to Hercules. 

t "Ambiguani tellure nova Salaminafuturam " — anew Salamis, which 
might in future be confounded with the old one. The new Salamis was 
in Cyprus. 



BOOK I. — ODE VII. 31 

Albus ut obscuro deterget nubila caelo 
Saepe Notus, neque parturit imbres 

Perpetuo, sic tu sapiens finire memento 

Tristitiam vitaeque labores 
Molli, Plance, mero, seu te fulgentia signis 

Castra tenent, seu densa tenebit 

Tiburis umbra tui. ; Teucer Salamina patremque 

Cum fugeret, tamen uda Lyaeo 
Tempora populea*^ fertur vinxisse corona, 

Sic tristes afFatus amicos : 

Quo nos cunque feret melior Fortuna parente, . 

Ibimus, o socii comitesque. 
Nil desperandum Teucro duce et auspice Teucro ; 

Certus enim promisit Apollo, 

Ambiguam tellure nova Salamina futuram.t / 

O fortes, pejoraque passi / 

Mecum s^pe viri, nunc vino pellite curas 1 

Cras ingens iterabimus aequor. ^ 



12 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE VIII. 

TO LYDIA. 

This ode has been paraphrased by Henry Luttrell into 
that elegant and playful satire upon the manners of his own 
day, called ' Advice to Julia.' The names are clearly ficti- 
tious. 
By all the gods, Lydia, O say, I implore, 

Why must love hurry Sybaris into perdition ? 
Why to him once so patient of dust and of sun 

Has the Campus become so detestably sultry ? 

Why with those of his age rides that hero no more, 

Curbing mouths fresh from Gaul'^ with a bit like a wolf- 
fang? 

Why afraid yellow Tiber to touch ? W^hy the oil 

Of the athlete more shunned than the froth of the viper ? 

Why in triumph no longer displays he that arm 

Which in black and in blue bore the signs of his prowess ? 

Ah, how often by disk or by dart beyond bound 

Has that arm to its owner brought noble distinction ! 

Where lurks he concealed, as they tell us lurked once, 
Kept from Troy's tearful funerals, the son of sea-Thetis, 

Lest to Lycian hosts, slaughter, and doom, hurried off, 
If the habit of manhood proclaimed him Achilles ? 

* " Gallica nee lupatis 
Temperat ora frenis." 
Gallic mouths — horses from Gaul. These were considered very high 
mettled, but, when well broken-in, so serviceable in war that they were 
in great request in the Roman cavalry. *' Lupatis," a bit, jagged like 
wolves' teeth. 



BOOK I.— ODE VIII. 33 

tious. ^Vhether the persons designated by the names existed 
is another matter — probably enough : their types are always 
existing. There is no reason for supposing the various 
Lydias whom Horace addresses were the same person ; every 
reason, judging by the internal e\'idence of the several 
poems, to suppose they were not. There is no other ode 
in this metre. 



Carm. VIII. 

Lydia, die, per omnes 
Te deos oro, Sybarin cur properes amando 

Perdere ; cur apricum 
Oderit campum, patiens pulveris atque solis? 

Cur neque militaris 
Inter asquales equitat, Gallica nee lupatis 

Temperat ora frenis }^ 
Cur timet flavum Tiberim tangere ? Cur olivum 

Sanguine viperino 
Cautius vitat, neque jam livida gestat armis 

Brachia, saepe disco, 
Saepe trans finem jaculo nobilis expedite? 

Quid latet, ut marinse 
Filium dicunt Thetidis sub lacrimosa Troiae 

Funera, ne virilis 
Cultus in caedem et Lycias proriperet catervas ? 



34 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE IX. 

TO THALIARCHUS. 

Thaliarchus signifies in Greek "arbiter bibendi" — com- 
monly translated " feastmaster." Some editors, as Dillen- 
burger and Macleane, refusing to consider it meant to be a 
proper name, print " thaliarche," " O feastmaster." Orelli 
and Yonge, however, retain the capital T, and it is perhaps 
more agreeable to Horace's habit of individualising generals, 
and is certainly more animated in itself, to consider, with 
Buttmann, that the word is meant for a proper name, though 
of course a fictitious one, and invented to signify the official 
character of the person addressed. I may also add that 
there is no instance, I believe, in Latin authors, in which 
the word thaliarchus is used as a feastmaster; and that, 
therefore, if Horace did not mean it to be considered a pro- 
per 

See how white in the deep-fallen snow stands Soracte ! 
Labouring forests no longer can bear up their burden ; 
And the rush of the rivers is locked, 
Halting mute in the gripe of the frost 

Thaw the cold; more and more on the hearth heap the fagots — 
More and more bringing bounteously out, Thaliarchus, 
The good wine that has mellowed four years 
In the great Sabine two-handled jar. 

Leave the rest to the gods, who can strike into quiet 
Angry winds in their war with the turbulent waters, 
Till the cypress stand calm in the sky — 
Till there stir not a leaf on the ash. 



BOOK I. — ODE IX. 35 

per name, it would have been unintelligible to those of his 
readers wl^o did not understand Greek ; and to those who 
did, would have appeared a pedantic affectation, which was 
precisely the reproach that a man of Horace's good taste 
and keen sense of the ridiculous would not voluntarily have 
incurred. The references to the manner in which Thaliar- 
chus may spend his day, all belong to the life of a town ; 
and there is no reason to suppose the scene otherwise than 
at Rome. Walckenaer says that the isolated and singular 
form of Soracte strikes the eye on quitting the city by one 
of the two gates to the north. 

Though, to judge by a fragment presented in Athenceus, 
the poem is more or less imitated from an ode by Alcaeus, 
the scene and manners are altogether Roman ; in fact, the 
more the fragments left of Greek poets are fairly compared 
with the verses in which they are imitated by Horace, the 
more Horace's originality in imitating becomes conspicuous. 



Carm. IX. 

Vides, ut alta stet nive candidum 
Soracte, nee jam sustineant onus 
Silvse laborantes, geluque 
Flumina constiterint acuto. 

Dissolve frigus, ligna super foco 
Large reponens ; atque benignius 
Deprome quadrimum Sabina, 
O Thaliarche, merum diota. 



Permitte divis cetera, qui simul 
Stravere ventos aequore ferv'ido 
Deproeliantes, nee cupressi 
Nee veteres agitantur omi. 



36 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Shun to seek what is hid in the womb of the morrow ; 

Count the lot of each day as clear gain in life's ledger ; 

Spurn not thou, who art young, dulcet loves ; 

Spurn not, thou, choral dances and song 

While the hoar-frost morose keeps aloof from thy verdure. 
Thine the sports of the Campus,"^ the gay public gardens ; 
Thine at twilight the words whispered low ; 
Each in turn has its own happy hour : 

And thine the sweet laugh of the girl — which betrays her 
Hiding slyly within the dim nook of the threshold. 
And the love-token snatched from the wrist, 
Or the finger's not obstinate hold. 



* " Campus et areae " — the Campus Martius, in which, in the forenoon, 
athletic sports were practised, and the public promenades (arese) in dif- 
ferent parts of the city, and especially round the temples, which were 
the resort of loungers in the afternoon. Orelli thus gi'acefully elucidates 
the concluding verse. "The scene," he says, "is this : the lover goes 
at the appointed hour to the door of his mistress, which stands ajar ; he 
calls upon her with low whispers : the girl keeps silence, having play- 
fully hid herself behind the threshold, until at last she betrays herself by 
her laugh. The lover then rushes in, and carries off as a love-pledge her 
bracelet or ring, after a struggle on her part not too pertinaciously coy," 



BOOK I. — ODE IX. 37 ] 



Quid sit futunim eras, fuge quserere, et 
Quern Fors dierum cunque dabit, lucro 
Appone, nee dulees araores 

Sperne, puer, neque tu choreas, 

Donee virenti canities abest 
Morosa. Nunc et campus et areae,'^ 
Lenesque sub noctem susurri 
Composita repetantur hora ; 

Nunc et latentis proditor intimo 
Gratus puellae risus ab angulo, 
Pignusque dereptum lacertis 
Aut digito male pertinaci. 



38 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE X. 

TO MERCURY. 

The scholiast Porphyrion says this ode was taken from 
Alcaeus, who, he asserts, and Pausanias confirms it, invented 
the story about Apollo's cows or oxen. The story is cele- 
brated 

Mercury, thou eloquent grandson of Atlas, 
Who didst the rude manners of earth's early races 
First mould into form, both by graceful Palaestra/^ 
And by skilled language — 

Of thee will I sing, to great Jove and Olympus 
Tight herald ; — sing thee of wreathed lute the inventor, 
So cunning to hide whatsoe'er the whim took thee 
Gaily to pilfer. 

When Phoebus in wrath sought to frighten thy childhood 
If thou didst not restore the kine tricksomely stolen, 
While threatening his shafts he was robbed of his quiver ; 
Laughed out Apollo ! 



* No English paraphrase can adequately render Palaestra, which was 
especially attributed to the invention of Hermes. It appears to have 
been originally distinct from the gymnasia, and appropriated chiefly 
to the training of the athletse in wrestling and the Pancratium. When 
towards the decline of the Republic the Romans imitated the Greeks in 
these and other less manly customs, they attached to their villas 
places for exercise called indiscriminately Gymnasia or Palaestrae. 
The meaning of the stanza is that Mercury taught the early races how to 
discipline body by skilled exercise, and express thought by cultivated 
language ; and I agree with Orelli in construing " voce " thus, and not 
as song or music, which is rather the gift of Apollo. 



BOOK I. — ODE X. 39 

brated in the Homeric hymn to Hermes, as well as the 
invention of the lyre by stringing a tortoise-shell, at whatever 
date that hymn was written. Horace always ascribes to Mer- 
cury the characteristics of the Greek Hermes, with whom the 
Mercurius of the Latins had little in common. 



Carm. X. 

Mercuri, facunde nepos Atlantis, 
Qui feros cultus hominum recentum 
Voce formasti catus, et decorae 
More palaestrae,* 

Te canam, magni Jovis et Deorum 
Nuntium, curv^que lyrae parentem ; 
Callidum, quiquid placuit, jocoso 
Condere furto. 

Te, boves olim nisi reddidisses 
Per dolum amotas, puemm minaci 
Voce dum terret, viduus pharetra 
Risit Apollo. 



40 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

So too, led by thee, Priam bearing his treasures 
From Ilion, eluded the vaunting Atridae,"^ 
The watchlights of Thessaly and the remorseless 
Tents of the Argive. 

Thou placest pure souls in the calm of blest dwellings. 
With golden staff shepherding ghost-flocks of shadow ; 
To gods, whether throned in Olympus or Hades, 
Equally welcome. 



* "Quin et Atridas." Here Horace abruptly elevates the astute- 
ness of Mercury from the playful thefts of infancy to the wise caution 
with which he leads the innocent and helpless through the severest 
dangers ; and then naturally, and with all his inimitable terseness, the 
poet represents him as conducting no less safely the souls of the dead. 
Throughout all those stanzas, from the theft of oxen, when Mercury 
was an infant in his cradle, to his crowning mission as the conductor 
of souls departed, the same ruling idea of stealth is preserved and dei- 
fied. Mercury steals the kine from Apollo, he steals Priam through the 
Grecian camp, he steals souls through the passage between earth and 
Hades, — all with a union of guarded secrecy and imperturbable serenity 
which, throughout the more playful attributes of Hermes, imply the gran- 
deur and inspire the awe that characterise a supernatural being. No 
deity can be more exclusively Greek in this combination of open joy- 
ousness and mystic power. It was a type of divinity as impossible to be 
conceived by the Latins as by the Germanic and Scandinavian races, 
though they all worshipped a Mercurius. 



' BOOK I. — ODE X. 41 

Quin et Atridas/^ duce te, superbos 
Ilio dives Priamus relicto 
Thessalosque ignes et iniqua Trojae 
Castra fefellit. 

Tu pias laetis animas reponis 
Sedibus, virgaque levem coerces 
Aurea turbam, superis deonim 
Gratus et imis. 



42 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XI. 

TO LEUCONOL 

The desire to solve the doubts by which man is beset in 
the present, will, perhaps, so long as the world lasts, give an 
audience to those who pretend to divine the future ; and of 
all modes of divination, astrology has been, from time im- 
memorial, the most imposing, because it arrogates the rank 
of a science, and asserts that it bases its predictions upon 
deductions from a vast accumulation of facts. Rome, of 
course, abounded in astrologers, who called themselves Chal- 

daeans, 

Nay, Leuconoe, seek not to fathom what death unto me — 

unto thee 
(Lore forbidden) the gods may assign ; nor the schemes of 

the Chaldee consult.^ 
How much better it is to learn patience, and that which 

shall be to endure ! 
Whether Jove may vouchsafe our existence more winters, 

or this be the last, 

Which now breaks Tuscan ocean in spray on the time-eaten 

rocks that oppose, 
Be thou wise, strain thy wine, and cut down lengthened 

hope to the brief span of life. 
While we talk, grudging Time will be gone, and a part of 

ourselves be no more. 
Seize to-day — for the morrow it is in which thy belief should 

be least. 



* "Nee Babylonios tentaris numeros" — i.e., the astrological calcu- 
lations, or, in technical phrase, "schemes," for which the Chaldees 
were so famous. 



BOOK I.— ODE XI. 43 

dseans, as Cicero calls them ; and were probably as much 
Chaldseans as the Gypsies of Norwood are Bohemians or 
Indians. Horace gives his fair friend a brief admonition, 
which, in proof of the common-sense that keeps him always 
modern, might be equally given to ladies, and even to the 
ruder sex, in our own day. For wherever we travel in Eng- 
land or Europe, it is rare to find a town, however de- 
ficient in books, in which a prophetic astrological almanac 
may not be seen in the shop-windows. 



Carm. XI. 

Tu ne quaesieris, scire nefas, quem mihi, quem tibi 
Finem Di dederint, Leuconoe, nee Babylonios 
Tentaris numeros."' Ut melius, quidquid erit, pati ! 
Seu plures hiemes, seu tribuit Juppiter ultimam, 

Quae nunc oppositis debilitat pumicibus mare 
Tyrrhenum, sapias, vina liques, et spatio brevi 
Spem longam reseces. Dum loquimur, fugerit invida 
^tas : carpe diem quam minimum credula postero. 



44 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XII. 

IN CELEBRATION OF THE DEITIES AND THE 
WORTHIES OF ROME. 

This poem is commonly inscribed very inappropriately 
'' De Augusto," and sometimes more accurately '' De laudi- 

bus 

What man, what hero, or what god select'st thou. 
Theme for sweet lyre or fife sonorous, Clio ? 
Whose honoured name shall that gay sprite-voice, Echo, 
H)ann back rebounding, 

Whether on Helicon's umbrageous margent. 
Whether on heights of Pindus or cold Haemus, 
Whence woods, at random, vocal Orpheus followed ? 
He who stayed rivers 

In their swift course, and winds in their wild hurry 
By art maternal;*" and with bland enchantment 
Led the huge oaks at his melodious pleasure 
List'ning his harp-strings. 

Whom should I place for wonted rites of homage 
Before the Father-King of gods and mortals, 
Who earth, and ocean, and heaven's varying seasons t 
Orders and tempers, 

From whom not greater than Himself proceedeth — 
To whom exists no semblance and no second ? 
Yet where he hath a nearest, be its honours 
Sacred to Pallas. 

* "Arte materna"— the Muse Calliope, mother of Orpheus, 
t " Qui mare ac terras variisque mundum 
Temperat horis." 
" Mundum " here means " coelum," " sky" — i.e., the whole framework 
of nature, in sea, earth, and heaven, is under the dominion of Jove. 



BOOK I. — ODE XII. 45 

bus Deorum vel hominum." It was certainly composed 
before the death of the young Marcellus, a.u.c. 731 ; and 
OrelH and Macleane agree in accepting Franke's date, 
A.U.C. 729. 



Carm. XII. 

Quern virum aut heroa lyra vel acri 
Tibia sumis celebrare, Clio ? 
Quern Deum? Cujus recinet jocosa 
Nomen imago 

Aut in umbrosis Heliconis oris 
Aut super Pindo gelidove in Hsemo ? 
Unde vocalem temere insecutae 
Orphea silvse, 

Arte materna* rapidos morantem 
Fluminum lapsus celeresque ventos, 
Blandum et auritas fidibus canoris 
Ducere quercus. 

Quid prius dicam solitis parentis 
Laudibus, qui res hominum ac deorum, 
Qui mare ac terras variisque mundum t 
Temperat horis ? 

Unde nil majus generatur ipso, 
Nee viget quidquam simile aut secundum 
Proximos illi tamen occupavit 
Pallas honores. 



46 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Left not unsung be Liber, bold in battle ; 
Nor she, the brute-world's foe — virgin Diana ; 
Nor thou, dread Lord of the unerring arrow, 
Phoebus Apollo ? 

Sing let me, too, the demigod Alcides, 
And Leda's twins, the rider and the athlete — 
At whose joint star, what time on storm-beat seamen 
Dawns its white splendour, 

Back from the rocks recedes the rush of waters, 
Winds fall — clouds fly — and every threatening billow, 
Lulled at their will, upon the breast of ocean 
Sinks into slumber. 

Should, after these, be Romulus first honoured, 
Numa's calm reign, or Tarquin's haughty fasces ? 
I pause in doubt ; or is it rather Cato's 
Noble self-slaughter? 

Regulus, and the Scauri,* and ^milius 
Lavish of his great life when Carthage triumphed, 
Grateful I name for song's most signal honours ; — 
Thee, too, Fabricius ; 

He and rude unkempt Curius and Camillus, — 
These were the men whom hardy thrift, rude nurture, 
The ancestral farm, and unluxurious homestead 
Fitted for warfare. 

Tree-like grows up through unperceived increases 
Marcellus't fame. As the moon throned in heaven 
'Mid lesser lights, the JuHan constellation 
Shines out resplendent. 



* Either the Scauri enjoyed at that time a higher reputation than they 
have retained in history, or Horace had some special reason, personal or 
political, now inexplicable, for placing them in the rank of Rome's fore- 
most worthies, ^milius Paulus, having advised the disastrous battle 



BOOK I.— ODE XII. 47 

Proeliis audax, neque te silebo, 
Liber, et saevis inimica Virgo 
Beluis : nee te, metuende certa 
Phoebe sagitta. 

Dicam, et Alciden, puerosque Ledae, 
Hunc equis, ilium superare pugnis 
Nobilem ; quorum simul alba nautis 

Stella refulsit, 
Defluit saxis agitatus humor, 
Concidunt venti, fugiuntque nubes, 
Et minax, quod sic voluere, ponto 

Unda recumbit. 

Romulum post hos prius, an quietum 
Pompili regnum memorem, an superbos 
Tarquini fasces, dubito, an Catonis 

Nobile letum. 
Regulum, et Scauros,* animseque magnse 
Prodigum PauUum, superante Poeno, 
Gratus insigni referam Camena, 

Fabriciumque. 

Hunc et incomptis Curium capillis 
Utilem bello tulit, et Camillum, 
Saeva paupertas et avitus apto 
Cum lare fundus. 

Crescit, occulto velut arbor sevo, 
Fama Marcelli;t micat inter omnes 
Julium sidus, velut inter ignes 
Luna minores. 



of Cannae, refused the horse offered to him by a tribune of the soldiers, 
and remained to perish on the field. 

+ *' As the name of Marcellus, whom I understand, with Orelli, to be 
the Marcellus who took Syracuse, stands for all his family, and particu- 
larly the young Marcellus, so the star of Julius Caesar, and the lesser 
lights of that family, are meant by what follows." — Macleane. 



48 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Father and Guardian of all human races, 
Saturnian Jove, to thee the Fates have given 
Charge o'er great Caesar ; mayst thou reign supremely, 
Next to thee Caesar. 

Whether the Parthians over Rome impending 
Grace his full ^ triumph, or the farthest dwellers, 
Indian and Seric, upon Orient margins 
Under the sunrise,t 

Wide earth with justice he shall rule, thy viceroy ; 
With awful chariot Thou shalt shake Olympus ; 
Thou through the sacred groves profaned impurely 
Launch angry lightnings. J 



* "Justo triumpho." "'Justo,' 'regular, full, complete,' in which 
sense this adjective is attached to such nouns as exercitus, legio, acies, 
prselium, victoria." — Yonge. 

f '* Sive subjectos Orientis orae 
Seras et Indos." 

The Seres, whom some conjecture to be the Chinese, represent the na- 
tions at the farthest east known to the Romans. *' Subjectos orae," 
" under the edge or extremity of the East." — Yonge. 

t " Tu gravi curru quaties Olympum, 
Tu parum castis inimica mittes 
Fulmina lucis. " 

The general meaning seems to be, that Jove left the political govern- 
ment of earth to Augustus, his vicegerent ; but he reserved to himself 
alone the dominion of heaven, and the task of avenging such crimes as 
offended the gods, or polluted the sanctity of the temples. 



BOOK I. — ODE XII. 49 

Gentis humanse pater atque custos, 
Orte Saturno, tibi cura magni 
Caesaris fatis data : tu secundo 
Caesare regnes. 

Ille, seu Parthos Latio imminentes 
Egerit justo'^ domitos triumpho, 
Sive subjectos Orientis orae 
Seras et Indos,t 

Te minor latum reget aequus orbem ; 
Tu gravi curru quaties Olympum, 
Tu parum castis inimica mittes 
Fulmina lucis.J 



50 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIII. 

TO LYDIA. 

In this ode is expressed naturally enough the sort of jeal- 
ousy which a Lydia would be likely to inspire in a general 
lover, such as Horace represents himself in his poems — "sive 
quid urimur non praeter solitum leves." The ode in 

itself, 
When thou the rosy neck of Telephus, 

The waxen arms of Telephus, art praising, 

Woe is me, Lydia, how my jealous heart 

Swells with the anguish I would vainly smother. 

Then in my mind thought has no settled base, 
To and fro shifts upon my cheek the colour, 

And tears that glide adown in stealth reveal 
By what slow fires mine inmost self consumeth. 

I burn, or whether quarrel o'er his wine. 

Stain with a bruise dishonouring thy white shoulders. 
Or whether my boy-rival on thy lips 

Leave by a scar the mark of his rude kisses. 

Hope not, if thou wouldst hearken unto me. 
That one so little kind prove always constant ; 

Barbarous indeed to wound sweet lips imbued 
By Venus with a fifth part of her nectar.'^ 

Thrice happy, ay more than thrice happy, they 
Whom one soft bond unbroken binds together. 

Whose love serene from bickering and reproach 
In life's last moment finds the first that severs. 

* " Quinta parte sui nectaris." It has been disputed whether Horace 
means by this expression the Pythagorean quintessence, which is ether. 
Most modern translators so take it — "an interpretation," says Macleane, 
" which I am surprised to find Orelli adopts with others, that does not 
commend itself to my mind at all." Neither does it to mine. I 



BOOK L— ODE XIII. 5 I 

itself, whether borrowed or not from a Greek original, is 
replete with the elegance which characterises Horace's love- 
poems, and there is a tenderness which seems genuine and 
heartfelt in the concluding stanza. 

The metre in Horace is the same as in Ode iii., but no 
English measure seems to me so well to express the sense 
and spirit of the ode as the graver and more elegiac form 
in which the translation is cast. 

Carm. XIII. 

Cum tu, Lydia, Telephi 
Cervicem roseam, cerea Telephi 

Laudas brachia, vae, meum 
Fervens difficili bile tumet jecur. 

Tum nee mens mihi nee color 
Certa sede manent ; humor et in genas 

Furtim labitur, arguens 
Quam lentis penitus macerer ignibus. 

Uror, seu tibi candidos 
Turparunt humeros immodicae mero 

Rixae, sive puer furens 
Impressit memorem dente labris notam. 

Non, si me satis audias, 
Speres perpetuum, dulcia barbare 

Laedentem oscula, quae Venus 
Quinta parte sui nectaris imbuit."^ 

Felices ter et amplius, 
Quos irrupta tenet copula, nee malis 

Divulsus querimoniis 
Suprema citius solvet amor die. 

think the interpretation rendered by Dillenburger much less pedantic 
and much more poetical. The ancients supposed that honey contained 
a ninth or tenth part of nectar, and therefore the lips of Lydia were 
imbued with double the nectar bestowed on honey. 



52 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIV. 

THE SHIP AN ALLEGORY. 

I know not what safer title for this poem can be 
selected from the many assigned to it in the MSS. All or 
most critics nowadays are agreed that it is a political allegory, 
and not, as Graevius, Bentley, and others contended, an ad- 
dress to the actual ship that brought Horace from Philippi, 
and in which his friends were about tore-embark. Quinctilian 
illustrates the meaning of the word "allegory" by a ref- 
erence to the ode, and the ode itself is an imitation of an 
allegorical poem by Alcaeus on the political troubles of 
Mitylene, of which a fragment is extant. Quinctilian's inter- 
pretation of the allegory, though still popularly received — 
viz., that the ship means the Commonwealth or Republic — is 
not without eminent disputants ; and unless there were more 
assured data as to the time in which the poem was written, 
and under what political circumstances, the dispute is not 
likely to be settled. The opinion advanced by Acron and 
supported with much force by Buttmann is, that the poem 
is addressed, not to the Commonwealth, but to a remnant 
of the political party with which Horace had fought under 
Brutus, and in remonstrance against their launching once 
more into civil war under Sextus Pompeius. This view has 
been somewhat rudely assailed, and the generality of critics 
remain loyal to the good old simile of Ship and State. 
But of late the argument of a critic at once so acute and 
so profound as Buttmann has been silently gaining ground 
with reflective scholars, and has much in its favour. No- 
thing in itself is more probable than that Horace should 
have sought to express to his old comrades in an allegori- 
cal poem his dissuasion from the hazardous junction with 



BOOK I. — ODE XIV. 53 

S. Pompeius, and place on record his own vindication 
for refusing to put forth in so shattered a vessel, and rest- 
ing in port — i.e., with the government established under 
Augustus. 

The other supposition most favoured as to the date of 
the poem is that which places it in the year before the 
battle of Actium, when M. Antony and Augustus were mak- 
ing their preparations for war. This does not seem so prob- 
able a date as the other. The images of the poem would 
ill accord with it. Horace could scarcely have said then 
that the ship under Augustus was disabled, destitute of rowers 
and chiefs, and could not last through a storm; and as in that 
war C^sar went forth against Antony rather than Antony 
against Csesar, the expostulation to keep in port would have 
been very ill received by Augustus, and very contrary to the 
spirit with which Horace always speaks of that war and its 
results, and to the wiUingness expressed in Epode i. to have 
taken a share in the enterprise, had Maecenas been appointed 
to command in it. At the outbreak of the war with Antony, 
Horace was a decided partisan of the established govern- 
ment, and this poem is evidently written by a man who has 
affection and fear for those about to hazard some new enter- 
prise against the existent order of things. He certainly 
would not have addressed that warning to Antony's sup- 
porters. Whether the poem allegorises the entire Repub- 
lic, or that party belonging to it with which Horace had 
been so intimately connected, and with whose renewed 
hazards he declined to associate himself, does not, however, 
very materially signify ; for a writer who has been a strong 
party-man generally has his party in his mind whenever he 
proposes to address the State. But if Horace really de- 
signed the allegory for his old comrades under Brutus, about 
to cast their fortunes with Sextus Pompeius, he could not more 
affectionately part from them, nor more delicately imply his 
own rational excuses for doing so. 



54 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

O ship, shall new waves drift thee back into ocean ? 
What wouldst thou ? Make fast, O, make fast for the haven ! 
Ah ! dost thou not see how thy sides 
Are all naked of even the rowers ? ^ 

And thy mast by the south wind in fury is shattered, 
And loud groan thy mainyards, and scarce,t without cables 
Undergirding the keel, couldst thou strive 
With the sway of the tyrannous waters. 

And thy sails are not whole, and the gods thou wouldst call on 
Once more in the stress of thy peril have left thee, 
August Pontic pine, J though thou art, 
Of a forest illustrious the daughter. 

All useless the race, and the name that thou vauntest ; 
Cautious sailors trust nought to the stern's painted colours. 
Beware, O beware, lest thou owe 

But a mock to the winds thou wouldst hazard. 

Thou, lately the cause of my wearisome trouble, 
Object now of deep care and regretful affection, 
Mark well where the Cyclades shine, 

And avoid the waves flowing between them. 

* I.e., whether the lines apply to the State or to a party in it, men and 
appliances are wanting to the cause. 

+ " Sine funibus vix durare carinse." The usual interpretation of 
*'funibus," " girding-ropes," is here adopted, Macleane construes, *' de- 
prived of her rigging." — See his note. 

:j: In translating these lines I feel very strongly how much tliey 
favour Acron's opinion and Buttmann's argument for the application 
of the allegory to the old Brutus party about to share the fortunes of the 
great Pompey's son, Sextus. The old gods, or the statues of the tutelary 
deities niched in the stem were indeed gone ; the cry for Republican 
liberty or Senatorial rights was hushed in the graves of Brutus and 
Cassius. Assuming with Acron and Buttmann that by the Pontic pine 
is symbolised Pompey, whose chief successes were achieved in Pontus 
as the conqueror of Mithridates, his name and race were indeed idly 
vaunted by Sextus. Recruits distmsted the colours painted on the 



BOOK L— ODE XIV. 55 



Carm. XIV. 

O navis, referent in mare te novi 
Fluctus ! O quid agis ? Fortiter occupa 
Portum ! Nonne vides, ut 
Nudum remigio latus,* 

Et malus celeri saucius Africo 
Antennagque gemant, ac sine funibust 
Vix durare carinas 
Possint imperiosius 

JEquor? Non tibi sunt integra lintea, ] 

Non di, quos iterum pressa voces malo : 
Quamvis Pontica pinus,J 

Silvae filia nobilis, ] 

Jactes et genus et nomen inutile ; 
Nil pictis timidus navita puppibus 

Fidit. Tu, nisi ventis ' 

Debes ludibrium, cave. \ 

Nuper sollicitum quae mihi tsedium, j 

Nunc desiderium curaque non levis, i 

Interfusa nitentes i 

Vites sequora Cycladas. 

. j 

battered ship to which they were invited. Applying the lines to the j 
cause of the old Brutus party, well might Horace exclaim, " Nuper ] 
sollicitum quse mihi taedium," in reference to the anxieties and to the ■ 
disgusts with which his share in that cause had subjected him, the j 
loss of friends and hopes and fortune; and well and tenderly might i 
he add, in affection for former comrades and deprecation of the perils 
they were about to risk, " Nunc desiderium curaque non levis." "Desi- • 
derium" is a word that implies affection, and "a missing of something 
— a regret." The whole of the poem thus construed seems to me in 
complete harmony with all the poems in which Horace takes a retro- 
spective view of hish-connection with Brutus's party, and the attachment J 
he retained for his old friends, so strongly evinced in his welcome to | 
Pompeius Varus, Lib. II, Ode vii. > 



56 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XV. 

THE PROPHECY OF NEREUS. 

This ode is considered by critics to bear the stamp of 
an early composition. It has certainly the vigour and fire 

of 
When the false Shepherd bore through the waters 
In Idsean ships, Helen his hostess, 
Nereus buried swift winds in loathed slumber 
That Fate's fell decrees he might sing. 

" Woe the day that thou lead'st to thy dwelling 
Her whom Greece shall ask back by great armies, 
Sworn in league to dissolve, with thy nuptials, 
The ancient dominion of Troy. 

" Ah ! what death-sweat to war-horse and warrior ! 
Ah ! what funerals that move with thy rowers 
Bring'st thou home to the race of the Dardan ! 
Already stern Pallas prepares 

"Helm, and aegis, and chariot, and fury; 
Vainly, bold in the safeguard of Venus, 
Shalt thou trim thy sleek locks and charm women 
With songs set to chords — not of war; "' 

"Vainly shun in thy paramour's chamber t 
Pond'rous spears and the darts of the Cretan, 
And the roar of the battle ; — and Ajax 
So swift when he follows a foe ; 

"Late, alas ! dust shall yet smear thy love-locks. 
Lo behind thee, thy race's destroyer, 
Lo Ulysses ! — lo Nestor ! — Thee, Teucer, 
Thee, Sthenelus skilled in the fight 

* "Carmina divides" — i.e., accompany your harp with singing. — 

YONGE. 

t Horn. II., iii. 381. 



BOOK I. — ODE XV. 57 

of youth, but it is seldom that the poetry of youth is equally 
terse and condensed. 



Carm. XV. 

Pastor cum traheret per freta navibus 
Idaeis Helenen perfidus hospitam, 
Ingrato celeres obruit otio 
Ventos, ut caneret fera 

Nereus fata : Mala ducis avi domum, 
Quam multo repetet Graecia milite, 
Conjurata tuas rumpere nuptias 
Et regnum Priami vetus. 

Heu, heu ! quantus equis, quantus adest viris 
Sudor ! quanta moves funera Dardanse 
Genti ! Jam galeam Pallas et «gida 
Currusque et rabiem parat. 

Nequicquam, Veneris prsesidio ferox, 
Pectes csesariem, grataque feminis 
Imbelli cithara carmina divides ; * 
Nequicquam thalamot graves 

Hastas et calami spicula Cnosii 
Vitabis, strepitumque et celerem sequi 
Ajacem ; tamen heu serus adulteros 
Crines pulvere coUines. 

Non Laertiaden, exitium tuse 
Genti, non Pylium Nestora respicis ? 
Urgent impavidi te Salaminius 
Teucer et Sthenelus sciens 



58 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

" Or the chariot-chase, fearlessly follow : 
Merion, too, thou shalt know, — but look yonder, 
Through the battle comes raging to find thee 
Tydides, more dread than his sire ! 

" Ah ! from him, as a hart in the valley 
Sees the wolf and forgetteth its pasture, 
All unnerved and deep-panting thou fliest ; 
Not such was the pledge to thy love ! 

" Though the wrath in the fleet of Achilles 
Bring a respite to Troy and Troy's mothers ; 
Ilion's domes, after winters predestined, 

Shall sink in the flames of the Greek ! " 



BOOK I. — ODE XV. 59 

Pugnae, sive opus est imperitare equis, 
Non auriga piger ; Merionen quoque 
Nosces. Ecce furit te reperire atrox. 
Tydides melior patre, 

Quern tu, cervus uti vallis in altera 
Visum parte lupum graminis immemor, 
Sublimi fugies mollis anhelitu, 
Non hoc pollicitus tuae. 

Iracunda diem proferet Ilio 
Matronisque Phrygum classis Achillei ; 
Post certas hiemes uret Achaicus 
Ignis Iliacas domos. 



6o THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XVI. 

RECANTATION. 

There is no ground for safe conjecture as to the person 
here addressed. The old inscriptions applying it to Tyn- 
daris, the daughter of Gratidia, celebrated as Canidia in 
the Epodes, or the assertion in Cruquius that it is Grati- 
dia herself, are now generally considered to be purely fic- 
titious. 
O, of mother so fair thou the yet fairer daughter, 
To such end as thou wilt put my guilty iambics, 
Fling them into the flames to consume, 
Or the ocean of Hadria to drown. 

Phrygian Cybele, no, nor the Pythian Apollo 
In the innermost shrines soul-convulsing his priesthood, 
No, nor Liber, nor Corybants mad 

When their cymbals redouble the clash, 

Craze the mind like the woeful disorders of anger. 
Which are scared from their vent, nor by Norican falchion, 
Wreckful oceans — untameable fires. 

Nor ev'n Jove though himself thunder down. 

It is said that Prometheus to man's primal matter 
Was compelled to add something from each living creature, 
And thus from the wild lion he took 
Rabid virus to place in our gall. 

Anger shattered in ruins the House of Thyestes ; 
Anger stands forth the cause by which cities have perished, 
And the ploughshare of insolent hosts 
Has passed over the site of their walls. 



BOOK I. — ODE XVI. 6 1 

titious. Horace, no doubt, in his youth wrote a great 
many satirical or vituperative poems which he had too 
good taste to repubhsh, and which, happily for his fame, 
have perished altogether. To some lady so libelled we 
may well suppose this ode to have been addressed, for it 
has an air of reality about it. It may have been suggested 
by the poem in which Stesichorus recanted his slanders on 
Helen, but to what extent Horace here imitates that poem, 
there are no means of judging. 

Carm. XVI. 

O matre pulchra filia pulchrior, 
Quem criminosis cunque voles modum 
Ponis iambis, sive flamma 
Sive mari libet Hadriano. 

Non Dindymene, non adytis quatit 
Mentem sacerdotum incola Pythius, 
Non Liber seque, non acuta 
Sic geminant Corybantes asra, 

Tristes ut ir^, quas neque Noricus 
Deterret ensis, nee mare naufragum, 
Nee ssevus ignis, nee tremendo 
Juppiter ipse ruens tumultu. 

Fertur Prometheus, addere principi 
Limo coactus particulam undique 
Desectam, et insani leonis 

Vim stomacho apposuisse nostro. 

Irse Thyesten exitio gravi 
. Stravere, et altis urbibus ultimo 
Stetere causae, cur perirent 

Funditus, imprimeretque muris 



62 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Be appeased then : that vehement heat of the bosom 
In the sensitive heyday of youth tempted me too, 
And it whirled me all frantic away 
Down the torrent of scurrilous song. 

Now I seek to exchange rude emotions for soft ones, 
Provided my penitence move thee to pardon, 
And my full recantation thus made, 
O be friends, and restore me thy heart. 



BOOK I. — ODE XVI. 63 

Hostile aratnim exercitus insolens. 
Compesce mentem : me quoque pectoris 
Tentavit in dulci juventa 
Fervor, et in celeres iambos 

Misit furentem ; nunc ego mitibus 
Mutare quaero tristia ; dum mihi 
Fias recantatis arnica 

Opprobriis, animumque reddas. 



64 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XVII. 

INVITATION TO TYNDARIS. 

It is impossible to do more than conjecture whether the 
person addressed under the feigned name of Tyndaris ac- 
tually existed or not. There are one or two touches in the 
poem which seem to individualise her as a creature of the 
earth — such as the selection of one particular song about 
the rivalry of Penelope and Circe, which is not a theme 
especially appropriate to the place of invitation, and may well 
have been the favourite song of some fair lute-player; -and 

the 

For Lucretilis oft nimble Faunus exchanges, 
So delightful its slopes, his Arcadian Lycasus — , 
From my she-goats still turning aside 
Rainy winds and the scorch of the sun. 

All in safety the wives of the strong-scented husband 
Rove where arbute and thyme lurk in woodlands secreted ; 
Never green adder daunts them, nor there 
Martial wolf from Haedilia descends, 

"Whilesoever, my Tyndaris, round and about us 
Ring the smooth sheeny lime-rocks of sloping Ustica, 
And the valleys embosomed below, 

With the sweet haunting pipe of the god. 

Over me watch the gods with an aspect of favour. 
To the gods dear at heart are the muse and my worship. 
Here our rich rural honours shall flow 
From a brimmed cornucopia to thee. 



BOOK I. — ODE XVII. 65 

the reference to the jealous violence of Cyrus looks like an 
allusion to some incident that had previously occurred. On 
the one hand, nothing is more likely than that Horace 
should have known, and invited to his villa, some such ac- 
complished freed-woman as is here addressed. On the 
other hand, nothing is more consonant to his exquisite art 
than the invention of attributes and incidents for the pur- 
pose of giving the interest of reality to a purely imaginary 
creation. A compliment to the beauty of the person ad- 
dressed is insinuated by the name of Tyndaris, " as if," says 
Orelli, " she were another Helen." 



Carm. XVII. 

Velox amoenum saepe Lucretilem 
Mutat Lycseo Faunus, et igneam 
Defendit aestatem capellis 

Usque meis pluviosque ventos. 

Impune tutum per nemus arbutos 
Quserunt latentes et thyma devise 
Olentis uxores mariti ; 

Nee virides metuunt colubras, 

Nee Martiales Haediliae lupos, 
Utcunque dulci, Tyndari, fistula 
Valles et Usticse cubantis 
Levia personuere saxa. 

Di me tuentur, dis pietas mea 
Et Musa cordi est. Hie tibi copia 
Manabit ad plenum benigno 
Ruris honorum opulenta comu. 

E 



66 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Here, within the deep vale, thou shalt shun the red dog-star, 
And shalt sing us that tale on the lute-strings of Teos, 
How Penelope vied with the Sea's 
Crystal Circe, for one human heart ; 

Safely here shalt thou quaff, under cool leafy shadows, 
Sober cups from the innocent vineyards of Lesbos ; 
'Tis not here that gay Semele's son '^ 

Shall with Mars his encounters confound ; 

Dread not here lest pert Cyrus, suspecting thee vilely. 
Lay rash hands on that form not a match for rude anger, 
Rend the garland which clings to thy hair, 
Or the robe — ^which deserves no such wrong. 



Bacchus. 



BOOK I. — ODE XVII. 6^ 

Hie in reducta valle Caniculae 
Vitabis sestus, et fide Teia 
Dices laborantes in uno 

Penelopen vitreamque Circen ; 

Hie innoeentis poeula Lesbii 
Duees sub umbra; nee Semeleius'^ 
Cum Marte confundet Thyoneus 
Proelia, nee metues protervum 

Suspeeta Cyrum, ne male dispari 
Ineontinentes injieiat manus, 
Et seindat haerentem eoronam 
Crinibus immeritamque vestem. 



68 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XVIII. 

TO VARUS. 

Varus was no uncommon name, and it has been a dispute 
with commentators what Varus is here addressed. It is 

generally 

Of all trees that thou plantest, O Varus, the vine, holy vine 
be the first, 

On the soil that surrounds genial Tibur and Catilus' ram- 
parted walls. 

To the lips of the dry does the godhead taint all with a 
taste of the sour, 

And only by wine are the troubles gnawing into the bosom 
dispersed. 

Fresh from wine who complains of the hardships he bears or 

in want or in war ? 
Who not more hails thee, Bacchus, as father ; thee, Venus, 

as linked with the Grace ? 
But Evius himself has forewarned us by his curse on the 

Thracians of old. 
And the battle o'er riotous wine-cups which the Centaurs 

with Lapithae fought, 

How the drunkard divides right from wrong by the vanish- 
ing line of his lust. 

And not to pass over the limit the Unbinder of Care has 
imposed. 

Ne'er will I force thy will, comely Bacchus, shake the thyrsus 
against thy consent,''^ 

Nor drag forth to daylight thy symbols covered over with 
manifold leaves. 

* ' ' Non ego te, candide Bassareu, 
Invitum quatiam, nee variis obsita frondibus 
Sub divum rapiam. " 
" Quatiam," poetically applied to the god himself, refers to the shaking 



BOOK L— ODE XVIII. 69 

generally believed to be the Quinctilius Varus for whose 
death Horace seeks to console Virgil, Ode xxiv. of this 
Book. 

By the way in which Bacchus and Venus are here ad- 
dressed, Horace implies a temperate and elegant convivi- 
ality ; Bacchus is hailed as father, benignant, not cruel ; 
and Venus as "decens" — that is, accompanied with the 
Graces, " ipsa decens est, cum comites sint decentes Gra- 
tiae" (Carm. i.4,6; Dillenburger) ; and the poet proceeds to 
contrast a Bacchus and a Venus so characterised with the 
brawl and lust of the Centaurs, who, invited to the marriage- 
feast of Peirithous, King of the Lapith^, attempted in their 
drunkenness to carry off the bride and the other women, 
which of course led to a fight with the Lapithae and with 
the Sithonians, a people in Thrace, who were afflicted by 
Bacchus with the curse of never drinking without fighting. 

Carm. XVIII. 

Nullam, Vare, sacra, vite prius severis arborem 
Circa mite solum Tiburis et moenia Catili. 
Siccis omnia nam dura deus proposuit, neque 
Mordaces aliter diffugiunt sollicitudines. 

Quis post vina gravem militiam aut pauperiem crepat ? 
Quis non te potius, Bacche pater, teque decens Venus ? 
At, ne quis modici transiliat munera Liberi, 
Centaurea monet cum Lapithis rixa super mero 

Debellata, monet Sithoniis non levis Evius, 
Cum fas atque nefas exiguo fine libidinum 
Discernunt avidi. Non ego te, candide Bassareu,'^ 
Invitum quatiam, nee variis obsita frondibus 

of the thyrsus, cymbals, or images in the wild dance of the Orgies, 
" Variis obsita frondibus " means the vessels in which the mystical sym- 
bols of Bacchus were concealed, covered over with various leaves, chiefly 
of vine and ivy. 



70 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Silence ! hush, savage horn Berecynthian ! let the clash of 

the timbrel be hushed, 
Making music which Self-conceit follows, dull egotist reeling 

stone-bHnd, 
Idle Vainglory over-exalting her empty and arrogant head, 
And a Faith which is lavish of secrets, — with bosom more 

seen through than glass. 



BOOK I. — ODE XVIII. 71 

Sub divum rapiam. Sseva tene cum Berecyntio 
Comu tympana, quae subsequitur caecus Amor sui, 
Et tollens vacuum plus nimio Gloria verticem, 
Arcanique Fides prodiga, perlucidior vitro. 



72 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIX. 

TO GLYCERA. 

Whether Glycera and Cinara be the same person — -whe- 
ther the Glycera here addressed be the same Glycera as is 

elsewhere 

Methought I had finished with love 
When the mother herself of the Cupids, merciless mother 
she is, 
And the Theban boy, Semele's son, 
And the goddess called Wantonness bade me to love again 
render my soul. 

It burns me that smoothness of light. 
Than the marble of Paros more pure, which is shed over 
Glycera's face — 
It burns me that dear saucy charm, 
And the look slippery- sheen to behold : he who loiters and 
gazes must fall. 

All Venus has rushed upon me, 
Deserting her templei^ in Cyprus. She will not permit me 
to sing 
Of the Scyth, and the feints of the steeds 
Which the Parthians wheel round on the foe, nor of aught 
which belongs not to love. 

Hither, slaves, quick ! an altar in haste — 
Pile it up with the green living sod ; hither vervain and 
frankincense bring. 
And wine winters two have matured : 
By the blood of a victim appeased, more gently the goddess 
may come. 



BOOK I. — ODE XIX. 73 

elsewhere mentioned — whether she existed anywhere or 
under any name except in Horace's fancy, — are questions 
that have been as fiercely debated as if they could be de- 
cided, or were of the slightest consequence if they could. 
The poem itself is charmingly pretty, but has much more 
the air of complimentary gallantry than of real affection. 



Carm. XIX. 

Mater saeva Cupidinum, 
Thebanaeque jubet me Semeles puer, 

Et lasciva Licentia, 
Finitus animum reddere amoribus. 

Urit me Glyceras nitor 
Splendentis Pario marmore purius ; 

Urit grata protervitas, 
Et voltus nimium lubricus adspici. 

In me tota mens Venus 
Cyprum deseruit ; nee patitur Scythas, 

Et versis animosum equis 
Parthum dicere, nee quae nihil attinent. 

Hie vivum mihi caespitem, hie 
Verbenas, pueri, ponite thuraque 

Bimi cum patera meri : 
Mactata veniet lenior hostia. 



74 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XX. 

TO M^CENAS. 

Nothing can be more simple in form and spirit than this 
ode, in which Horace invites Maecenas to a homely enter- 
tainment in language equally unostentatious. In this, as in 
other of Horace's purely occasional odes, one feels, by the 
abstemious avoidance of the would-be poetical, that only a 

poet 

Thou wilt drink but in modest cups Sabine wine humble 
Which I with mine own hand in Grecian cask hoarded. 
When the theatre hailed thee with plaudits, beloved. 
Knightly Maecenas, 

So loud, as if fain that the gay phantom Echo 
To thine ear from the heights of the Vatican mountain. 
To thine ear from the banks of thy river ancestral. 
Might reapplaud them. 

Thou mayst drink at thy will the rich Caecuban vintage. 
Or the milder grapes Gales have tamed in its presses : 
Formian slopes, vines Falernian, combine not to flavour 
My simple wine-cups. 



BOOK I.— ODE XX. 75 

poet could have written it. The date of the poem has been 
variously conjectured. Judging by the reference to the 
Sabine wine which Maecenas is invited to drink, and which 
came into use in its second year, reaching its prime in 
its fourth, the poem would have been written between two 
and four years after the reception that the audience at the 
theatre gave to Maecenas on his recovery from his illness. 
But the date of that event is not determined. Franke and 
Liibker refer the composition of the ode to a.u.c. 729-730. 
Macleane favours the latter year. Orelli inclines to Weber's 
date, from a.u.c. 726-727. 



Carm. XX. 

Vile potabis modicis Sabinum 
Cantharis, Graeca quod ego ipse testa 
Conditum levi, datus in theatro 
Cum tibi plausus. 

Care M^cenas eques, ut patemi 
Fluminis ripae, simul et jocosa 
Redderet laudes tibi Vaticani 
Montis imago. 

Caecubum et prelo domitam Caleno 
Tu bibes uvam : mea nee Falemae 
Temperant vites, neque Formiani 
Pocula colles. 



76 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XXI. 

IN PRAISE OF DIANA AND APOLLO. 

It was supposed by Franke that this hymn was composed 
for the first celebration of the quinquennial games — Ludi 
Actiaci — instituted by Augustus in honour of Apollo and 
Diana, when he dedicated a temple to Apollo on the 
Palatine after his return from the taking of Alexandria, a.u.c. 
726. There are two objections to this supposition : — the 
one, observed by Macleane, is in the word " principe," for 
Augustus did not get that title till the ides of January a.u.c. 

727, 
Hymn ye the praise of Diana, young maidens. 
Hymn ye, O striplings, the unshorn Apollo, 
And hymn ye Latona, so dear 

To the Father Supreme in Olympus. 

Maidens, sing her who delights in the rivers, 
And the glad locks on the brow of the forests 
That nod over Algidus cold. 

Verdant Cragus and dark Fryman thus. '^ 

Youths, sing of Tempe with emulous praises, 
Delos, the fair native isle of Apollo, 
And sing of the shoulder adorned 

With the quiver, and shell of the Brother.t 

Moved by your prayer, may the god in his mercy 
Save, from war and from pest and from famine. 
Our people, and Caesar our prince. 

And direct them on Persia and Britain. 



* ' ' Nigris aut Erymanthi 

Silvis, aut viridis Cragi." 
The epithet "viridis" applied to Cragus is in opposition to "nigris" 
applied to Erymanthus, from the different kinds of foliage on either moun- 



BOOK I. — ODE XXI. 'J'J 

727, and therefore after the first celebration of the Actian 
games. The other objection is in the nature of the poem 
itself, which, as Orelli remarks, is of too light a quill for the 
ceremonial pomp of solemn games or earnest supplication. 
The reference to the Persians and Britons at the close 
would seem to intimate the same date as the 29th Ode of 
this Book, when Augustus was preparing a military expedi- 
tion against Briton and the East, viz., a.u.c. 727. The notion 
of Sanadon, that the ode was an introduction to the Saecular 
Hymn, has long been exploded. 

Carm. XXI. 

Dianam tenerae dicite virgines, 
Intonsum, pueri, dicite Cynthium ; 
Latonamque supremo 
Dilectam penitus Jovi. 

Vos laetam fluviis et nemorum coma, 
Quaecunque aut gelido prominet Algido, 
Nigris aut Erymanthi 
Silvis, aut viridis Cragi ; * 

Vos Tempe totidem tollite laudibus, 
Natalemque, mares, Delon ApoUinis, 
Insignemque pharetra 

Fraternaque humerum lyra.t 

Hie bellum lacrimosum, hie miseram famem 
Pestemque a populo, et principe Caesare, in 
Persas atque Britannos 
Vestra motus aget prece. 

tain, Cragus being covered with oak and beech, Eiymanthus with pine 
and fir. 

+ " Fraternaque humerum lyra " — the shell invented by his brother 
Mercury. 



yS THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XXII. 

TO ARISTIUS FUSCUS. 

Of Aristius Fuscus Horace speaks (Epp. i. lo) with parti- 
cular affection. He says " they were almost twins in their 

tastes 

He whose life hath no flaw, pure from guile, need not 

borrow 
Or the bow or the darts of the Moor, O my Fuscus ! 
He relies for defence on no quiver that teems with 
Poison-steept arrows. 

Though his path be along sultry African Syrtes, 
Or Caucasian ravines, where no guest finds a shelter, 
Or the banks which Hydaspes, the stream weird with fable,'" 
Licks languid-flowing. 

For as lately I strayed beyond pathways accustomed, 
And with heart free from care was of Lalage singing, 
A wolf in the thick of the deep Sabine forest 
Met, and straight fled me. 

All unarmed though I was ; yet so deadly a monster 
Warlike Daunia ne'er bred in her wide acorned forests, 
Nor the thirst-raging nurse of the lion — swart Juba's 
African sand-realm. 

Place me lone in the sterile wastes, where not a leaflet 
Ever bursts into bloom in the breezes of summer ; 



* " Fabulosus lambit Hydaspes." As Horace is here conjuring up 
images of terror, so it is to the darker legends connected with the Indian 
river that he alludes in the epithet " fabulosus," a signification which is 



BOOK I. — ODE XXII. 79 

tastes and sentiments." Fuscus appears to have been an 
author, but there is some doubt as to what he wrote, — 
Acron says 'Tragedies' — Porphyrion, 'Comedies;' which 
last supposition seems more in keeping with the humorous 
joke he plays upon Horace, Sat. i. 9. Cruquius says he 
was a grammarian. 



Carm. XXII. 

Integer vitae scelerisque purus 
Non eget Mauris jaculis, neque arcu, 
Nee venenatis gravida sagittis, 
Fusee, pharetra; 

Sive per Syrtes iter sestuosas, 
Sive facturus per inhospitalem 
Caucasum, vel quse loca fabulosus 
Lambit Hydaspes.* 

Nam que me silva lupus in Sabina, 
Dum meam canto Lalagen, et ultra 
Terminum curis vagor expeditis, 
Fugit inermem ; 

Quale portentum neque militaris 
Daunias latis alit aesculetis. 
Nee Jub^ tellus generat, leonum 
Arida nutrix. 

Pone me, pigris ubi nulla campis 
Arbor aestiva recreatur aura- 



aimed at in the translation " weird with fable." "Lambit" literally 
means "licks," or "laps up," not "washes," or "laves," as it is com- 
monly translated. Horace does not wish to convey the pleasing idea of 
a river with a gentle and placid flow, but rather the still, languid, awe- 
inspiring motion of the haunted wave upon the sultry banks. 



8o THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Sunless side of the world, which the grim air oppresses, 
Mist-clad and ice-bound ; 

Place me lone where the earth is denied to man's dwelling, 
All so near to its breast glows the car of the day-god ; 
And I still should love Lalage — her the sweet-smiling, 
Her the sweet-talking.* 



* " Dulce ridentem Lalagen amabo, 
Dulce loquentem." 

If I might have allowed myself to expand the literal words of th 
original into what seems to me the sense implied by the poet, I shoulu 
have proposed to translate the lines thus : — 

" I still should love Lalage — see her, sweet smiling ; 
Hear her, sweet talking. " 

For I take it that Horace does not merely mean that he would still 
love Lalage " sweetly smiling " and " sweetly talking " — an assurance 
which seems in itself to belong to a school of poetry vulgarly called 
namby-pamby— -but rather that, however solitary, still, and lifeless be 
the place to which he might be transported, he would still be so true to 
her image, that in the solitude he would see her sweetly smiling, and 
amidst the silence hear her sweetly talking. So Constance, in Shake- 
speare, says: — 

" Grief fills the room up of my absent child, 
Lies in her bed, walks up and down with me, 
Pttts on her pretty looks, repeats her words." 



BOOK I.— ODE XXII. 8 1 

Quod latus mundi nebulae malusque 
Juppiter urget ; 

Pone sub curru nimium propinqui 
Solis, in terra domibus negata : 
Dulce ridentem Lalagen amabo, 
Dulce loquentem,* 






82 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XXIII. 

TO CHLOE. 

This ode has the appearance of being imitated, though 
but sHghtly, from a fragment in Anacreon preserved in 
' Athenaeus,' ix. p. 396. But it is not the less an illustration 
of the native grace with which Horace invests his more 
trivial compositions. 

Like a fawn dost thou fly from me, Chloe, 
Like a fawn that, astray on the hill-tops, 
Her shy mother misses and seeks, 

Vaguely scared by the breeze and the forest. 

Sighs the coming of spring through the leaflets ? 
Slips the green lizard stirring a bramble ? 
Her knees knock together with fear. 
And her heart beats aloud in its tremor. 

Nay, but not as a merciless tiger, 
Or an African lion I chase thee ; 
Ah ! cling to a mother no more, 

When thy girlhood is ripe for a lover. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXIII. 83 1 



Carm. XXIII. 



Vitas hinnuleo me similis, Chloe, 
Quaerenti pavidam montibus aviis 
Matrem, non sine vano 
Aurarum et silus metu. 



Nam seu mobiiibus veris inhorruit 
Adventus foliis, seu virides nibum 
Dimovere lacertae, 

Et corde et genibus tremit 

Atqui non ego te, tigris ut aspera 
Gaetulusve leo, frangere persequor 
Tandem desine matrem 
Tempestiva sequi viro. 



84 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXIV. 

TO VIRGIL ON THE DEATH OF QUINCTILIUS VARUS. 

Quinctilius died a.u.c. 730. Little is known of him be- 
yond the mention with which he is immortaHsed by Horace. 
In the Ars Poetica he is spoken of as dead, and as having 
been a frank and judiciously severe critic, who, if you trusted 

your 

What shame or what restraint unto the yearning 
For one so loved ? Music attuned to sorrow 
Lead* thou, Melpomene, to whom the Father 
Gave liquid voice and lyre. 

So, the eternal slumber clasps Quinctilius, 
Whose equal when shall shame-faced sense of Honour, 
Incorrupt Faith, of Justice the twin sister, 
Or Truth unveiled, find ? 

By many a good man wept, he died ; — no mourner 
Wept with tears sadder than thine own, O Virgil ! 
Pious, alas, in vain ! thou redemandest 
Quinctilius from the gods ; 

Not on such terms they lent him ! — Were thy harp-strings 
Blander than those by which the Thracian Orpheus 
Charmed listening forests, never flows the life-blood 
Back to the phantom form 

Which Hermes, not reopening Fate's closed portal 
At human prayer, amid the dark flock shepherds 
With ghastly rod. Hard ! yet still Patience ligh1,ens 
That which admits no cure. 

* "Precipe" — "lead."— YoNGE. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXIV. 85 j 

■I 
i 

your verses to him, would bid you correct this and that. If j 

you replied you could not do better — that you had tried twice \ 

or thrice in vain — he would tell you to strike the lines out 1 

altogether, and put them anew on the forge. This character ] 

as critic is in harmony with the character here assigned to ' 

him as man (verses 7, 8). 1 



Carm. XXIV. 

Quis desiderio sit pudor aut modus 
Tam cari capitis? Praecipe* lugubres 
Cantus, Melpomene, cui liquidam Pater 
Vocem cum cithara dedit. 

Ergo Quinctilium perpetuus sopor 
Urget ! cui Pudor, et Justitise soror, 
Incorrupta Fides, nudaque Veritas 
Quando ullum inveniet parem ? 

Multis ille bonis flebilis occidit ; 
Nulli flebilior quam tibi, Virgili, 
Tu frustra pius, heu ! non ita creditum 
Poscis Quinctilium deos. 

Quod si Threicio blandius Orpheo 
Auditam moderere arboribus fidem, 
Non vanae redeat sanguis imagini, 
Quam virga semel horrida, 

Non lenis precibus fata recludere, 
Nigro compulerit Mercurius gregi. 
Durum ! Sed levius fit patientia, 
Quidquid corrigere est nefas. 



86 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXV. 

TO LYDIA. 

Little need be said about this poem. The reader has 
been already warned against the assumption that in the appli- 
cation of names, evidently fictitious, to poems of this kind, 
the same person is designated by the same name. It is 
obviously too absurd to suppose that the blooming Lydia 
of the 13th Ode in this very Book is identical with the 
faded hag lampooned in the following ode. The poem it- 
self is, with others of the same kind, only valuable as illus- 
trative of Horace's character on its urban or town-bred side 
— its combination of the man of a fashionable world when at 
Rome, and of the solitary poet wrapped in his fancies, and 

meditating 

More rarely now shake thy closed windows 
With quick knocks of petulant gallants, — 
They break not thy sleep ; to thy threshold 
Fondly the door clings 

Once turning so glib on its hinges. 
Thou hear'st less and less, " Lydia, sleep'st thou ? 
'Tis I — all night long for thee dying — 
I thine own lover ! " 



Now thou whin'st that this new generation 
Likes but young shoots of ivy and myrtle, 
And dedicates dry leaves to Hebrus,* 
Winter's cold comrade ? 



* " Hebro" — a river in Thrace : as we should say, "to the north 
pole.". 



BOOK L— ODE XXV. 8/ 

meditating his art amidst Sabine woods or in the watered 
valleys of Tibur. In the translation, the third and fourth 
stanzas of the original are omitted. In these omitted stanzas 
the taste is sufficiently bad to vitiate the poetry. Horace 
never writes worse than when he is cynical. Cynicism was 
in him a spurious affectation, contrary to his genuine nature, 
which was singularly susceptible to amiable, graceful, gen- 
erous, and noble impressions of man and of life. 



Carm. XXV. 

Parcius junctas quatiunt fenestras 
Ictibus crebris juvenes protervi, 
Nee tibi somnos adimunt, amatque 
Janua limen, 

Qu^ prius multum facilis movebat 
Cardines ; audis minus et minus jam, 
" Me tuo longas pereunte noctes, 
Lydia, dormis?" 

Invicem mcechos anus arrogantes 
Flebis in solo levis angiportu, 
Thracio bacchante magis sub inter- 
lunia vento, 

Cum tibi flagrans amor et libido. 
Quae solet matres furiare equorum, 
Saeviet circa jecur ulcerosum : 
Non sine questu, 

Laeta quod pubes hedera virente 
Gaudeat pulla magis atque myrto, 
Aridas frondes hiemis sodali 
Dedicet Hebro.* 



88 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXVI. 

TO L. ^LIUS LAMIA. 

Horace addresses this same Lamia again, Lib. III. Ode 
xviii. Lamia must have been very young when this ode was 
written, the date of which is to be guessed from the refer- 
ence to Tiridates and the Parthian disturbances. Assum- 
ing with OrelH, Macleane, and others, that it was composed 
A.U. c. 729, just before Tiridates fled from his kingdom. 
Lamia survived fifty- seven years, dying a.u.c. 786 (Tac. 
Ann., vi. 27). 

I, the friend of the Muses, all fear and all sorrow 
Will consign to wild winds as a freight for Crete's ocean ; 
I'm the one man who feels himself safe, 
Whatever king reigns at the Pole — 

Whatever the cause that appals Tiridates. 
Muse, thou sweetener of life, haunting hill-tops Pimpleian, 
Whose delight is in founts ever pure, 

Weave the blooms opened most to the sun — 

O weave for the brows of my Lamia the garland : 
Nought my praise without thee. Let thyself and thy sisters 
Make him sacred from Time by the harp 
Heard at Lesbos ; but new be its strings. 



BOOK I.— ODE XXVI. 89 



Carm. XXVI. 

Musis amicus, tristitiam et metus 
Tradam protervis in mare Creticum 
Portare ventis, quis sub Arcto 
Rex gelidae metuatur orae, 

Quid Tiridaten terreat, unice 
Securus. O, quae fontibus integris 
Gaudes, apricos necte flores, 
Necte meo Lamiae coronam, 

Pimplea dulcis ! Nil sine te mei 
Prosunt honores : hunc fidibus novis, 
Hunc Lesbio sacrare plectro 
Teque tuasque decet sorores. 



90 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXVII. 

TO BOON COMPANIONS. 

In this poem, as in others of a convivial nature, Horace 
transports himself as it were into the midst of the company, 
and imparts an air of reality to an imaginary scene, so that 
it seems as if actually an impromptu. 

Brawl and fight over cups which were born but for pleasure * 
Is the custom in Thrace. Out on manners barbaric, 
Do not put modest Bacchus to shame 
By the scandal of bloody affrays. 
In what strange want of keeping with wine-cups and lustres 
Are the dirks of the Mede. Hush that infamous clamour, 
Be quiet ! Companions ! seats — seats ! 
Lean in peace on prest elbows again ! 

Do you wish me to share a Falernian so doughty? 
Well then, let the young brother of Locrian Megilla 
Reveal by what wound, by what shaft 
He is smitten and dies — happy boy. 
What, refuse ? tut ! I drink on no other condition. 
Come, no matter what Venus may conquer thee — ^blush not, 
For we know that thy sins in that way 
Must be always high-bred and refined. 
Nay, thy secret is safe in these faithful ears whispered, 
Ha ! indeed luckless wretch ! whirled in what a Charybdis ! 
How I pity thy struggles, O youth. 
Thou, so worthy less dismal a flame ! 
O what witch or, with potions Thessalian, what wizard — 
Nay, what god could avail from such coils to release thee? 
From that triple Chimaera's embrace 
Scarce could Pegasus carry thee off. 

* ** Natis in usum Isetitise scyphis." *' Natis "— *' born," as if made 
by nature, and destined exclusively for that purpose. — Orelli. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXVII. QI 



Carm. XXVII. 

Natis* in usum laetitiae scyphis 
Pugnare Thracum est : tollite barbanim 
Morem, verecundumque Bacchum 

Sanguineis prohibete rixis ! j 

Vino et lucemis Medus acinaces - 

Immane quantum discrepat : impium j 

Lenite clamorem, sodales, 1 

Et cubito remanete presso ! ! 

I 
Voltis severi me quoque sumere 
Partem Falemi ? Dicat Opuntias 

Frater Megillae, quo beatus j 
Vulnere, qua pereat sagitta. 

Cessat voluntas ? Non alia bibam 
Mercede. Quse te cunque domat Venus, 

Non erubescendis adurit ! 

Ignibus, ingenuoque semper I 

Amore peccas. Quidquid habes, age, i 
Depone tutis auribus. Ah miser, 

Quanta laborabas Charybdi, | 

Digne puer meliore flamma ! j 



Quse saga, quis te solvere Thessalis 
Magus venenis, quis poterit deus ? 
Vix illigatum te triformi 
Pegasus expediet Chimsera. 



92 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXVIII. 

ARCHYTAS. 

No ode in Horace has been more subjected than this one 
to the erudite ingenuity of conflicting commentators; nor 
are the questions at issue ever hkely to find a solution in 
which all critics will be contented to agree. 

The earlier commentators took for granted that the ode 
was composed as a dialogue between the ghost of Archytas 
and a voyager. The voyager, landing on the shore of Msl- 
tinus, finds there the unburied bones of Archytas, and in- 
dulges in a sarcastic soliloquy, which ends either at verse 6, 
verse i6, verse 20, or, as Macleane was once of opinion, in 
the middle of verse 15 — 

*' Sed omnes una manet nox." 

Two other theories have been started, by both of which 
Archytas is got rid of altogether. According to the first 
theory, the moralising voyager continues his reflections over 
the grave of the great geometrician, till (whether at verse 
15, 16, or 20) the ghost, not of Archytas, but of another, 
whose bones are bleaching on the sand, rises up, accosts 
him, and prays to be sprinkled with the dust that may serve 
for burial and fit him for the Styx. 

The second theory, favoured by Macleane, and supported 
by Mr Long, dispenses not only with Archytas, but with the 
notion of dialogue. According to this conjecture, the whole 
poem is assigned to the ghost of a shipwrecked and unburied 
man, who moralises over Archytas and the certainty of death, 
&c., till, seeing a living sailor approach, he asks for burial. 
This supposition, the simplest in itself, and sanctioned by 
great critical authorities, appears to be gaining a more gene- 



BOOK I. — ODE XXVIII. 93 

ral, if recent, assent with scholars than any other hypothesis 
— and, after much consideration, I have adopted it in my 
version. If the poem is, however, to be considered a dia- 
logue, I should not agree with Macleane in placing the 
division at verse 15,'^ but at verse 20 — "Me quoque 
devexi," &c. The very abruptness of the interposition of 
the ghost at that line, which has been considered by many 
critics objectionably harsh, appears to me a special merit. 
The ghost, commencing his appeal at that verse, goes at 
once to the purpose. He, being dead, has no need to say 
that all must die ; but, contenting himself with briefly 
informing the voyager that he has been drowned, hastens 
to implore the handfuls'of dust which suffice for burial. 
That it is not Archytas himself who speaks, whether in 
monologue or dialogue, is, I think, made perfectly apparent 
by the second and third verses of the ode — 

" Mensorem cohibent, Archyta, 
Pulveris exigui prope litus parva Matinum 
Munera," 

which I agree with Macleane in considering clearly to 
intimate that the body of Archytas has already received that 
which he is supposed so earnestly to pray for. " For," thus 
continues this judicious scholar, •' though many, I am aware, 
get over this difficulty by supposing ' cohibent munera ' to 

* I believe that most critics are now agreed that if the poem be a 
dialogue the first speaker cannot be interrupted at verse 6, or before 
verse 15. The lines 14, 15 — 

" Judice te non sordidus auctor 
Naturae verique," 

seem to settle that question. Archytas, if commencing at line 16, 
could scarcely appeal to the sailor as a judge of the learning of Pytha- 
goras, while the first speaker would very appropriately say that Archy- 
tas was a judge of it. The attempt to get over this difficulty by corrupt- 
ing a text sanctioned by all the MSS., and. substituting "me judice" 
for *'te judice," is nowadays rejected by rational commentators, who 
rightly oppose unauthorised amendments of texts supported by the con- 
currence of MSS. 



94 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

mean that the want of the scanty gift of a little earth was 
keeping him back from his rest, I do not see how the words 
will bear that sense; nor can I translate ' cohibent' withDillen- 
burger and others as if it was meant that his body occupied 
only a small space on the surface of the ground. The words 
can only mean that he was under the sand, whether partially 
or otherwise, and in either case he could not require dust to 
be cast three times on him." — Macleane, ' Introduction to 
Ode xxviii. Lib. I.' 

The conjecture of Liibker and others that Horace is sup- 
posing himself to be a ghost drowned off Palinurus, is too 
far-fetched and fantastic for serious refutation. For these 
and other points in controversy the reader is referred to 
Orelli's Excursus and Macleane's Introduction to this ode. 

The poem itself is singularly striking. Though abounding 
in those observations of the brevity of life and the certainty of 
death in which Horace so frequently indulges, with the half- 
sportive melancholy of a nature eminently sensuous, the 
poem has, on the whole, something almost of a Gothic char- 
acter. The humour takes the sombre colour of the medie- 
val Dance of Death, and is not without a touch of the genius 
which speaks in the grave-diggers of Hamlet. It is impossible 
to fix a date for its composition \ but I incline to rank it 
among Horace's earlier odes, from a certain likeness in its 
tone and treatment to the 5th Epode, which has also some- 
what of the Gothic character in its gloomy earnestness of 
description, and its employment of the grotesque as an 
agency of terror. 

I concur in the general opinion that the scene is laid 
at the promontory of Matinus, where Archytas is said to 
have had his tomb. Macleane sees no occasion for that 
supposition, and thinks the subject of the ode is more likely 
to have been suggested at Tarentum than elsewhere. He 
deems " that the words ' Neptuno custode Tarenti ' seem to 
fix the scene, and that it does not appear why a person speak- 



BOOK I. — ODE XXVIII. 95 

ing at Matinus should talk of Neptune particularly as the 
'custos Tarenti.'" 

I do not see the force of this objection. Neptune was 
particularly honoured at Tarentum, where he is said to have 
had a temple, and of which his son Tarns was the mythical 
founder. On the coins of Tarentum Neptune is represented 
as the tutelary deity. It would appear, therefore, quite nat- 
ural that Neptune should be mentioned as the guardian of 
Tarentum, as Fortune is elsewhere mentioned as the guardian 
of Antium, without supposing that the person so referring to 
the deity was in the neighbourhood of the place specially 
protected; while the length at which Archytas is addressed 
at the commencement seems to indicate the scene as that in 
which the philosopher so emphatically selected was buried. 
Archytas himself was a Greek of Tarentum, which would 
render yet more appropriate a reference to that city whoever 
may be supposed to be speaking — the poem having com- 
menced with the address to the shade of the great Tarentian. 

Archytas was amongst the most illustrious of the ancient 
worthies — a general, a statesman, a philosopher, and espe- 
cially a mathematician. He belonged to the Pythagorean 
school, but is supposed to have founded a new sect. The 
alleged inventor of analytical geometry, he is said to have 
originated the application of mathematics to mechanics, and 
constructed a flying dove of wood, which was to the myths 
of the ancients what Roger Bacon's brazen head is to those 
of the modems. He is considered to have been a contem- 
porary of Plato, and Aristotle wrote a life of him which is 
lost. 

The metre is the same as in Ode vii., but I have not em- 
ployed the same measure in the translation, thinking that 
the spirit of it requires the more elegiac rhythm which I 
have appropriated to some of the Epodes, and, indeed, to 
some other of the Odes. 



96 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Thee, arch-surveyor of the earth and ocean 

And the innumerous sands, Archytas, thee, 

Pent in a creeklet margined by Matinus, 

The scanty boon of trivial dust keeps close. 

What boots it now into the halls of Heaven 

To have presumed, and drawn empyreal air, 

Ranged through the spheres and with thy mind of mortal 
Swept through creation to arrive at death ? 

The sire of Pelops with the gods did banquet, 
And yet he died; — remote into thin air 

Vanished, if lingering long, at last Tithonus ; 

Minos shared Jove's high secrets, — yet he died. 

The son of Panthous, though he called to witness* 
His ancient buckler and the times of Troy, 

That to grim death he gave but skin and sinew, 

Tartarus regains, — and, this time, holds him fast ; 

Yet he of Truth and Nature, in thy judgment, 

Was an authority of no mean rank. 
But one Night waits for all, and one sure pathway 

Trodden by all, and only trodden once. 

Some do the Furies to grim Mars exhibit 

On the red stage in which disports his eye ; 

The greedy ocean swallows up the sailors ; 

Old and young huddled swell the funeral throng ; 

* The shield of Euphorbus, son of Panthous (the valiant Trojan who 
wounded Patroclus), was preserved with other trophies in the temple 
of Juno at or near My cense ; and according to a well-known legend, 
Pythagoras recognised this shield as that which he had borne when he 
lived in the person of Euphorbus. The son of Panthous, therefore, means 
Pythagoras, whom the speaker sarcastically compliments as no mean 
judge of truth and nature in the opinion of Archytas, who belonged to 
his school. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXVIII. 97 



Carm. XXVIII. 

Te maris et terrae numeroque carentis arenae 
Mensorem cohibent, Archyta, 

Pulveris exigui prope litus parva Matinum 
Munera, nee quidquam tibi prodest 

Aerias tentasse domos, animoque rotundum 
Percurrisse polum, morituro. 

Occidit et Pelopis genitor, conviva deorum, 
Tithonusque remotus in auras, 

Et Jovis arcanis Minos admissus, habentque 
Tartara Panthoiden iterum Oreo 

Demissum ; quamvis, elypeo Trojana refixo 
Tempora testatus, nihil ultra 

Nervos atque eutem Morti eoncesserat atrae, 
Judiee te non sordidus auetor 

Naturae verique. Sed omnes una manet nox, 
Et ealeanda semel via leti. 

Dant alios Furiae torvo speetaeula Marti ; 
Exitio est avidum mare nautis ; 



98 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Each head ''' must pay to Proserpine the poll-tax. 

Me also, Notus,t hurrying on to join 
His comrade setting amidst storm, Orion, 

Plunged into death amid Illyrian waves. 

But thou, O sailor, churlishly begrudge not 

A sand-grain to my graveless bones and skull ; 

So may whatever the east wind shall threaten 
To waves Hesperian, pass thee harmless by 

And waste its wrath upon Venusian forests : 

So from all-righteous Jove and him who guards 

Tarentum's consecrated haven, Neptune, 

Be every profit they can send thee showered. 

Think'st thou 'tis nought to doom thy guiltless children 
To dread atonement for their father's wrong ? 

Nay, on thyself may fall dire retribution 

And the just laws that give back scorn for scorn. 

I'll not be left, with prayers disdained, revengeless, 
No expiation could atone such crime ; 

Whate'er thy haste, this task not long delays thee — 
A little dust thrice sprinkled — then away. 



* "Nullum saeva caput Proserpina fugit " — in allusion to the lock 
of hair which, according to the popular superstition, Proserpine cut off 
from the head of the dying. 

f "Me also, Notus," &c. If the poem be supposed a dialogue, it 
seems to me that this is the place at which the second speaker, as the 
ghost of an unburied man, suddenly starts up and interposes. — See Intro- 
duction. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXVIII. 99 

Mixta senum ac juvenum densentur funera, nullum 
Sseva caput Proserpina fugit* 

tMe quoque devexi rapidus comes Ononis 

Illyricis Notus obruit undis. 
At tu, nauta, vagae ne parce malignus arense 

Ossibus et capiti inhumato 

Particulam dare : sic, quodcunque minabitur Eurus 

Fluctibus Hesperiis, Venusinae 
Plectantur silv^, te sospite, multaque merces, 

Unde potest, tibi defluat aequo 

Ab Jove, Neptunoque sacri custode Tarenti. 

Negligis immeritis nocituram 
Postmodo te natis fraudem committere ? Fors et 

Debita jura vicesque superbae 

Te maneant ipsum : precibus non linquar inultis, 

Teque piacula nulla resolvent. 
Quamquam festinas, non est mora longa ; licebit 

Injecto ter pulvere curras. 



100 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXIX. 

TO ICCIUS. 

In the 1 2th Ode of this Book Horace referred to the 
expedition into Arabia Felix meditated by Augustus, and 
which was sent from Egypt, a.u.c. 730, under the com- 
mand of the Governor of Egypt, ^Hus Gallus. Many 
Roman youths were attracted to this expedition by love 
of adventure and hope of spoil ; among others, the Iccius 
here addressed, who survived to become the peaceful 
steward to Vipsanius Agrippa's estates in Sicily. The 
good-natured banter on the warlike ardour conceived by a 
student of philosophy, was probably quite as much enjoyed 
by Iccius himself as by any one. They who suppose that 
so well-bred a man of the world as Horace is always insinu- 
ating moral reproofs to the friends he publicly addresses, 
are the only persons likely to agree with the scholiasts that 
he means gravely to rebuke Iccius for avarice in coveting 
the wealth of the Arabs. 

So, Iccius, thou grudgest their wealth to the Arabs, 
Wouldst war on kings Sheban, as yet never conquered, 
And art sternly preparing the chains 
For the arms of the terrible Mede ? 

What virgin barbaric shall serve thee as handmaid, 
Her betrothed being laid in the dust by thy falchion ? 
And what page, born and bred in a court, 
Nor untaught Seric arrows to launch 

From a bow-string paternal, with locks sleek and perfumed. 
Shall attend at thy feasts, and replenish thy goblets ? 
Who that rivers can flow to their founts, 
And the Tiber runs back, will deny, 

If the sage of a promise so rare can surrender 
All that priceless collection, the works of Pansetius, 
And the school in which Socrates taught, 
In exchange for a Spanish coat-mail ? 



BOOK I. — ODE XXIX. 101 



Carm. XXIX. 

Icci, beatis nunc Arabum invides 
Gazis, et acrem militiam paras 
Non ante devictis Sabaes 
Regibus, horribilique Medo 

Nectis catenas ? Quae tibi virginum 
Sponso necato barbara serviet ? 
Puer quis ex aula capillis 
Ad cyathum statuetiir unctis, 

Doctus sagittas tendere Sericas 
Arcu paterno ? Quis neget arduis 
Pronos relabi posse rivos 

Montibus, et Tiberim reverti, 

Cum tu coemptos undique nobiles 
Libros Panasti, Socraticam et domum, 
Mutare loricis Hiberis, 
PoUicitus meliora, tendis ? 



102 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XXX. 

VENUS INVOKED TO GLYCERA's FANE. 

This ode has the air of a complimentary copy of 
verses to some fair freed -woman who had fitted up a 
pretty fane to Venus, probably in the grotto, or antrum, at- 
tached to her residence. 

Venus, O queen of Cnidos and of Paphos, 
Spurn thy loved Cyprus — ^here transfer thy presence : 
Decked is the fane to which, with incense lavish, 
Glycera calls thee. 

Bring with thee, glowing rosy red, the Boy-god, 
Nymphs and loose-girdled Graces, and — if wanting 
Thee, wanting charm — bring Youth, nor let persuasive '^ 
Mercury fail us. 



* For the addition of this explanatory epithet, see the notes of Orelli 
and Dillenburger. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXX. 103 



Carm. XXX. 

O Venus, regina Cnidi Paphique, 
Sperne dilectam Cypron, et vocantis 
Thure te multo Glycerae decoram 
Transfer in aedem. 

Fervidus tecum Puer, et solutis 
Gratiae zonis, properentque Nymphse, 
Et pamm comis sine te Juventas, 
^'Mercuriusque. 



104 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXXI. 

PRAYER TO APOLLO. 

After the battle of Actium, Augustus, in commencing the 
task of social refortner, restored the ancient temples and 
built new ones. Amongst the latter, a.u.c. 726, he dedicated 
to Apollo a temple, with a library attached to it, on the 
Palatine. This charming poem expresses the poet's private 
supplication to the god thus newly installed. 

What demands at Apollo's new temple the poet ? 
For what prays he outpouring new wine in libation ? 
Not fertile Sardinia's rich sheaves, 
Not sunny Calabria's fair herds ; 

Neither prays he for gold, nor the ivory of Indus, 
Nor the meadows whose margin the calm-flowing Liris 
Eats into with murmurless wave. 
Let those on whom Fortune bestows 

So luxurious a grape, prune the vine-trees of Cales, 
And let trade's wealthy magnate exchange for the vintage 
Spiced cargoes of Syria, and drain 

Cups ^ sculptured for pontiifs in gold ; 

Dear, indeed, to the gods must be he who revisits 
Twice and thrice every year the Atlantic, unpunished : 
To me for a feast, mallows light. 
And endives and olives suffice. 

Give me health in myself to enjoy the things granted, 
O thou son of Latona ; sound mind in sound body ; 
Keep mine age free from all that degrades. 
And let it not fail of the lyre. 



* " CuluUis," sculptured cups used by the pontiffs and Vestal virgins 
in the sacred festivals. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXI. 1 05 



Carm. XXXI. 

Quid dedicatum poscit Apollinem 
Vates ? quid orat, de patera novum 
Fundens liquorem ? Non opim^ 
Sardinise segetes feraces, 

Non aestuosae grata Calabrise 
Armenta, non aurum aut ebur Indicum, 
Non rura, quas Liris quiesta 
Mordet aqua tacitumus amnis. 

Premant Galena falce, quibus dedit 
Fortuna, vitem ; dives et aureis 
Mercator exsiccet culullis * 
Vina Syra reparata merce, 

Dis cams ipsis, quippe ter et quater 
Anno revisens aequor Atlanticum 
Impune. Me pascunt olivae, 
Me cichorea levesque malvae. 

Frui paratis et valido mihi, 
Latoe, dones, et, precor, integra 
Cum mente ; nee turpem senectam 
Degere, nee cithara carentem. 



I06 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXXII. 

TO HIS LYRE. 

This short invocation to his lyre has the air of a prelude 
to some meditated poem of greater importance. Several 
of the Manuscripts commence " Poscimus," which reading 
Bentley adopts. The modern editors agree in preferring 
''Poscimur," which has more of the outburst of song, and 
renders the poem more directly an address to the lyre. 

We are summoned. If e'er, under shadow sequestered, 
Has sweet dalliance with thee in light moments of leisure 
Given birth to a something which lives, and may, haply, 
Live in years later, 

Rouse thee now, and discourse in the strains of the Roman, 
Vocal shell, first attuned by the patriot of Lesbos, 
Wlio, in war though so fierce, yet in battle, or mooring 
On the wet sea-sand 

His bark, tempest-tossed, chaunted Liber, the Muses, 
Smiling Venus, the Boy ever clinging beside her, 
And, adorned by dark locks and by eyes of dark lustre, 
Beautiful Lycus.,^ 

O thou grace of Apollo, O charm in Jove's banquets, 
Holy shell, dulcet solace of labour and sorrow, 
O respond to my greeting, when I, with rite solemn, 
Duly invoke thee. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXII. 107 



Carm. XXXII. 

Poscimur. Si quid vacui sub umbra 
Lusimus tecum, quod et hunc in annum 
Vivat et plures ; age, die Latinum, 
Barbite, carmen, 

Lesbio primum modulate civi. 
Qui, ferox bello, tamen inter arma, 
Sive jactatam religarat udo 
Litore navim, 

Liberum, et Musas, Veneremque, et illi 
Semper haerentem Puerum canebat, 
Et Lycum nigris oculis nigroque 
Crine decorum. 

O decus Phoebi, et dapibus supremi 
Grata testudo Jo vis, O laborum 
Dulce lenimen, mihi cumque salve 
Rite vocanti. 



I08 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXXIII. 

TO ALBIUS TIBULLUS. 

This poem is addressed to the most touching of all the Latin 
elegiac poets, Tibullus. Various but not satisfactory attempts 
have been made to identify Glycera with one of the two 
mistresses, Nemesis and Delia, celebrated in TibuUus's extant 
elegies. 

Nay, Albius, my friend, set some bounds to thy sorrow. 
Let not this ruthless Glycera haunt thee for ever. 
Nor, if in her false eyes a younger outshine thee, 
Such heart-broken elegies dole. 

With passion for Cyrus glows low-browed Lycoris,* 
Cyrus swerving to Pholoe meets with rough usage : 
When with wolves of Apulia the roe has her consort. 
With that sinner Pholoe shall sin. 

'Tis ever the way thus with Venus — it charms her 
To mate those that match not in mind nor in person ; 
In jest to her yoke she compels the wrong couples j 
Alas ! cruel jest, brazen yoke ! 

Myself, when a far better love came to woo me, 
Myrtale the slave-born detained in fond fetters j 
And Hadria can fret not the bay of Tarentum 
So sorely as she fretted me. 

* "Insignem tenui fronte Lycorida." So again, " Nigros angusta 
fronte capillos" — Epp. I. vii. 26 : a low forehead seems to have long re- 
mained in fashion. Petronius, c. 126, in describing a beautiful woman, 
says, "Frons minima et quae apices capillorum retro flexerat." Low 
foreheads came into fashion again at the close of the last century with the 
French Republic. Both with men and women the hair was then brought 



BOOK I.— ODE XXXIII. 1 09 



Carm. XXXIII. 

Albi, ne doleas plus nimio, memor 
Immitis Glycerse, neu miserabiles 
Decantes elegos, cur tibi junior 
Laesa prseniteat fide. 

Insignem tenui fronte Lycorida * ' 
Cyri torret amor, Cyrus in asperam 
Declinat Pholoen ; sed prius Apulis 
Jungentur capreae lupis, 

Quam turpi Pholoe peccet adultero. 
Sic visum Veneri, cui placet impares 
Formas atque animos sub juga aenea 
Saevo mittere cum joco. 

Ipsum me, melior cum peteret Venus, 
Grata detinuit compede Myrtale 
Libertina, fretis acrior Hadriae 
Curvantis Calabros sinus. 



down to the very eyebrow, as may be seen in the portraits of that time. 
Yet the Greek sculptors in the purer age of art did not give low fore- 
heads to their ideal images of beauty, and it is difficult to guess why an 
intellectual people like the Romans should have admired a peculiarity 
fatal to all frank and noble expression of the human countenance. The 
Roman ladies were accustomed to hide their foreheads by a bandage, 
elegantly called " nimbus" — i.e ., the cloud which accompanied the ap- 
pearance of the celestials. 



no THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXXIV. 

TO HIMSELF. 

In this poem Horace appears to recant the Epicurean 
doctrine, which referred to secondary causes, and not to the 
providential agency of Divine power, the government of the 
universe, and which he professed. Sat. I. v, loi, and Epp. 
I. iv. 1 6. But, in fact, he candidly acknowledges his own 
inconsistency in all such matters, and is Stoic or Epicurean 
by fits and starts. In this ode he evidently connects the 
phenomenon of thunder in a serene sky with the sudden re- 
volutions of fortune. The concluding verses are generally 
held to refer to the Parthian revolution, in which power was 
transferred now from Phraates to Tiridates, and again 
from Tiridates back to Phraates. In the last stanza — 

" Hinc apicem rapax 
Fortuna cum stridore acuto 

Sustulit, hie posuisse gaudet " — 

it was suggested in the ' Cambridge Philological Museum,' 
May 1832, that Horace had in his mind the legend of 
the eagle taking off the cap of Tarquinius. For the conve- 
nience of the general reader the story may be briefly thus 

told. 
Worshipper rare and niggard of the gods, 
While led astray, in the Fool's wisdom versed, 
Now back I shift the sail. 

Forced in the courses left behind to steer : 

For not, as wont, disparting serried cloud 
With fiery flash, but through pure azure, drove 
Of late Diespiter 

His thundering coursers and his winged car ; 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXIV. Ill 

told. Demaratus, one of the Bacchiadae of Corinth, flying 
from his native city when Cypselus destroyed the power of 
that aristocratic order, settled at Tarquinii, in Etniria, and 
married an Etruscan \vife. His son Lucumo succeeded to 
his wealth, and married Tanaquil, of one of the noblest 
families in Tarquinii, but being, as a stranger, excluded from 
state offices, Lucumo, urged by his wife, resolved to remove 
to Rome. Just as he and his procession reached the Janic- 
ulum, within sight of Rome, an eagle seized his cap, soared 
with it to a great height — "cum magno clangore" — and then 
replaced it on his head. Tanaquil predicted to him the 
highest honours from this omen, and Lucumo, who assumed 
the name of Tarquinius Prisons, ultimately obtained the 
Roman throne. Macleane, in referring to the legend, and 
to the reference to Phraates, thinks it not probable that Ho- 
race meant to allude to both these historical facts together, 
and is therefore inclined to suppose that he intended neither 
one nor the other. His objection does not impress me. 
Nothing is more probable than that Horace should exem- 
plify the sudden act of fortune in the Parthian revolution 
and render his allusion more lively by a metaphor borrowed 
from a familiar Roman myth. 



Carm. XXXIV. 

Parous deorum cultor et infrequens, 
Insanientis dum sapientiae 

Consultus erro, nunc retrorsum 
Vela dare, atque iterare cursus 

Cogor relictos : namque Diespiter, 
Igni corusco nubila dividens 
Plerumque, per purum tonantes 
Egit equos volucremque cumim ; 



112 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Wherewith the fixed earth and the vagrant streams — 
Wherewith the Styx and horror-breathing realms 
Of rayless Tasnarus, shook — 

Shook the world's end on Atlas. A god reigns, 

Potent the high with low to interchange, 
Bid bright orbs wane, and those obscure come forth : 
Shrillingly Fortune swoops — 

Here snatches, there exultant drops, a crown. 



BOOK I.— ODE XXXIV. TI3 

Quo bmta tellus et vaga flumina, 
Quo Styx et invisi horrida Taenari 
Sedes, Atlanteusque finis 

Concutitur. Valet ima summis 

Mutare, et insignem attenuat deus, 
Obscura promens ; hinc apicem rapax 
Fortuna cum stridore acuto 
Sustulit, hie posuisse gaudet. 



114 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXXV. 

TO FORTUNE. 

Macleane places the date of this ode a.u.c. 728, when 
Augustus was meditating an expedition against the Britons 
and another against the Arabs. Fortune is here distinguished 
from Necessity, and recognised as a Divine InteUigence, ra- 
ther with the attributes of Providence than those of Fate. 
As Fortune had her oldest temples in Rome, so she seems 
to have been the last goddess whose worship was deserted 
by the Roman emperors. 

Goddess, who o'er thine own loved "^ Antium reignest, 
Present to lift Man, weighted with his sorrows 
Down to life's last degree, 

Or change his haughtiest triumphs into graves; — 

To thee the earth's poor tiller prays imploring — 
To thee, Queen-lady of the deeps, whoever 
Cuts with Bithynian keel 

A passing furrow in Carpathian seas.t 

Thee Dacian rude — thee Scythia's vagrant nomad J — 
Thee states and races — thee Rome's haughty children — 
Thee purple tyrants dread. 

And the pale mothers of Barbarian kings. 

Lest thou spurn down with scornful foot the pillar 
Whereon rest states ;§ lest all, from arms yet lingering, 

* " Gratum — Antium." Orelli prefers interpreting **gratum " as "di- 
lectum," "dear to the goddess," rather than as *'amoenum," or "plea- 
sant." 

+ /.^., whether man ploughs earth or sea he equally prays to Fortune. 

X " Profugi Scythise." The epithet "profugi " applies to the nomad 
character of the Scyth, not to simulated flights as those of the Parthian 
cavalry. 

§ " Stantem columnam." The standing column was the emblem of 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXV. II5 



Carm. XXXV. 

O Diva, gratum* quae regis Antium, 
Praesens vel imo tollere de gradu 
Mortale corpus, vel superbos 
Vertere funeribus txiumphos ; 

Te pauper ambit sollicita prece 
Ruris colonus ; te dominam ^quoris, 
Quicunque Bithyna lacessit 
Carpathium pelagus carina. t 

Te Dacus asper, te profugi Scythae, J 
Urbesque gentesque et Latium ferox, 
Regumque matres barbarorum, et 
Purpurei metuunt tyranni, 

Injurioso ne pede proruras 

Stantem columnam, § neu populus frequens 



fixity and firmness. " In ancient monuments," says Dillenburger, " the 
column is thus assigned to images of Peace, Security, Felicity." Horace 
naturally writes in the spirit of his land and age in deprecating civil tu- 
mult as the most formidable agency for the overthrow of the column and 
the destruction of government and order. 



Il6 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

To arms some madding crowd 

Rouse with the shout to which an empire falls. 

Thee doth untamed Necessity for ever 
Stalk fierce before ; — the ship nails and the wedges 
Bearing in grasp of bronze, 

Which lacks nor molten lead nor steadfast clamp.* 

But thee Hope follows, and rare Faith, the white-robed, 
True to thee, even when thou thyself art altered. 
And from the homes of Power 

Passest away, in mourning weeds, a foe ; 

While the false herd, the parasite, the harlot, 
Shrink back : their love is dried up with the wine-cask. 
Their lips reject its lees ; 

Their necks will halve no yoke that Sorrow draws. 

Guard Caesar, seeking on earth's verge the Briton, — 
Guard Rome's young swarm of warriors on the wing, 
Where they alight, to awe 

The rebel East and Araby's red sea. 

Shame for the scars, the guilt, the blood of brothers ! 
What have we shunned — we, the hard Age of Iron ? 
What of crime left intact ? 
What youthful hand has fear of heaven restrained ? 

Where stands an altar sacred from its rapine ? 
Dread goddess, — steel made blunt in impious battles 
On anvils new reforge ; 
And turn its edge on Arab and on Scyth ! 

* Most recent commentators of authority agree in rejecting the notion 
of the commentator in Cruquius, adopted by earlier editors, that "uncus " 
and " pkimbum " are used here as emblems of punishment and crime, 
and consider them as emblems of tenacity and fixity of purpose. Mac- 
leane observes that the metaphor of molten lead for strengthening build- 
ings is employed by Euripides, 'Androm.,' 267. Herder suggests that 
the whole picture of Necessity and her attributes is taken from some pic- 
ture in the temple of Fortune at Antium. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXV. 117 i 

* \ 

Ad arma cessantes, ad arma I 
Concitet, imperiumque frangat 

Te semper anteit saeva Necessitas, 

Clavos trabales et cuneos manu j 

Gestans aena ; nee sevenis | 

Uncus abest, liquidumque plumbum.''' ! 

■\ 

Te Spes et albo rara Fides colit : 

Velata panno, nee comitem abnegat, i 

Utcunque mutata potentes J 

Veste domos inimica linquis. ! 

J 

At volgus infidum et meretrix retro \ 
Perjura cedit ; diffugiunt cadis 
Cum fsece siccatis amici, 

Ferre jugum pariter dolosi. S 

Serves iturum Caesarem in ultimos 
Orbis Britannos, et juvenum recens 

Examen Eois timendum i 

Partibus, Oceanoque mbro. \ 

I 

Eheu ! cicatricum et sceleris pudet | 

Fratrumque. Quid nos dura refugimus j 

^tas ? quid intactum nefasti \ 

Liquimus ? unde manum juventus j 

Metu deorum continuit? quibus 

Pepercit aris ? O utinam nova 

Incude diffingas retusum in 

Massagetas Arabasque ferrum ! \ 



Il8 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXXVI. 

ON NUMIDA's return from SPAIN. 

Horace congratulates Numida on his return from Spain — 
probably from the army with Augustus, a.u.c. 730. Who 
Numida was can be only matter of conjecture. 

Repay both with incense and harp-string, 

Repay with theheifer's blood due, Numida's guardians divine; 
Safe back from Hesperia the farthest, 

Now among loving friends shares he many a brotherly kiss. 

But the portion of Lamia is largest ; 

Mindful of childhood subjected to the same monarch's"" 
control, 
And how they both, donning the toga. 

Leapt into manhood together. Let not this happy day lack 

The registered mark of the Crete stone : 

Be there no stint to the wine-cask, be there no pause to 
the feet. 
Blithe in the bound of such measure 

Salii on holidays dance to ! Bassus shall gallantly vie 

With Damalis, queen of she-topers, 

Toss off his cup with a swallow like the grand drinkers of 
Thrace ;t 
And banquets shall want not the roses, 

Garlands of parsley the long-lived, garlands of lilies the brief. 

All eyes shall for Damalis languish ; 

But yet more encircling than ivy, climbing its way as it winds, 
Shall Damalis, proof to their glances. 

Turning aside from the old loves, cling root and branch 
to the new. 

* *' Memor actas non 'alio rege puertise," Most modem scholars by 
**rege" understand schoolmaster. 

+ **Threicia amystide." "Amystis" was a deep draught taken 
without drawing breath. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXVI. II9 



Caem. XXXVI. 

Et thure et fidibus juvat 

Placare et vituli sanguine debito 
Custodes Numidse deos, 

Qui nunc, Hesperia sospes ab ultima, 

Caris multa sodalibus, 

Nulli plura tamen dividit oscula 
Quam dulci Lamise, memor 

Actse non alio rege puertis,'" 

Mutatseque simul togas. 

Cressa ne careat pulchra dies nota, 
Neu promptse modus amphorse_, 

Neu morem in Salium sit requies pedum, 

Neu multi Damalis meri 

Bassum Threicia vincat amystide,t 
Neu desint epulis ross, 

Neu vivax apium, neu breve lilium. 

Omnes in Damalin putres 

Deponent oculos, nee Damalis novo 
Divelletur adultero, 

Lascivis hederis ambitiosior. 



120 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXXVII. 

ON THE FALL OF CLEOPATRA. 

In this ode Horace conspicuously manifests his unri- 
valled art of combining terseness and completeness. The 
animated rapidity with which the images succeed each 
other does not render them less distinct. The three pic- 
tures of Cleopatra constitute the action of a drama; her 
insolent power with its Oriental surroundings, — her flight 
and fall, — her undaunted death. And while, with his in- 
herent manliness of sentiment, Horace compels admiration 

for 

Drink, companions, the moment has come for carousal, 
And the foot is now free to strike earth in brisk measures. 
For Salian* feasts now may be decked 
The couches of statues divine. 

Not before was it lawful from time-honoured cellars 
To draw forth into light the stored Caecuban juices, 
While ruin and death were prepared 
For Rome, by the fell madding Queen, 

With her horde of vile eunuchs and outcasts polluted, 
Fooled by hope, drunk with sweets in the chalice of Fortune : 
Soon sobered when slunk from the flames 
That enveloped her navies — one ship ! 



* The Salii were the priests of Mars Gradivus, twelve in number. 
Their habitual festival was in March, when they paraded the city in 
their official robes, carrying with them the twelve sacred shields of Mars, 
which they struck with rods, keeping time to the stroke by song and 
dance. At the conclusion of the festival the Salii partook of a banquet, 
proverbial for its magnificence, in the temple of Mars. * ' Pulvinaria " 
are the couches on which the statues were placed, as if the gods them- 
selves were banqueters. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXVII. 121 

for the foe who defrauds the victor of his triumph, and dies 
a queen, that very generosity of his serves more to justify 
the joyous exultation with which the poem commences, 
since it impHes the determined nature of the great enemy 
from whom Rome is delivered. The date of the poem is 
sufficiently clear. M. TuUius Cicero, son of the orator, 
brought to Rome the new^s of the taking of Alexandria, and 
the deaths of Antony and Cleopatra, Sept., a.u.c. 724, suggest- 
ing this exhortation to private and public rejoicings. It will 
be observed here, as elsewhere, how Horace avoids naming 
Mark Antony. Two lines from a fragment of Alcseus are 
cited by commentators to show that the commencement of 
this ode is imitated from them. They rather serve to show 
with what sedulous avoidance of servility Horace does 
imitate, and how thoroughly Roman the whole treatment 
of his poem is, w^hatever be the lines to which a Greek 
poem may furnish hint and suggestion. 



Carm. XXXVII. 

Nunc est bibendum, nunc pede libero 
Pulsanda tellus j nunc Saliaribus* 
Omare pulvinar deorum 

Tempus erat dapibus, sodales. 

Antehac nefas depromere Caecubum 
Cellis avitis, dum Capitolio 
Regina dementes ruinas, 
Funus et imperio parabat 

Contaminato cum grege turpium 
Morbo virorum, quidlibet impotens 
Sperare, fortunaque dulci 
Ebria. Sed minuit furorem 



122 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Speeding on to transfix into true forms of terror 
The visions which fumes Mareotic"^ engender, 
As falcon that swoops on the dove, 
As hunter that chases the hare 

On the snow plains of Hsemus, — from Italy plying 
Rapid oars on her flight near and nearer comes Caesar, 
To chain, as the gapeshow of Rome, 
The fair fatal monster. Too great 

For such end, she but sought by what death to defy it. 
She recoiled from the sword with no womanlike shudder. 
She crowded no sail to far shores 

Where life might lurk safe and obscure. 

Brave to gaze with calm look round her desolate palace, 
Strong to grasp with firm hand and provoke the fierce 
serpents 
That, there where she fixed them, her veins 
Might best the black venom imbibe ; 

Bolder made in the death thus assured by stern purpose, 
She begrudged to the savage Liburnianst their captive ; 
In no insolent triumph was drawn 
Discrowned, the grand woman-queen. 

* ' ' Mentemque lymphatam Mareotico. " * ' Lymphatam " denotes panic 
or visionary terrors (" lymphata somnia "). " Lympha " and " nynipha," 
as Macleane observes, are the same word. Nympliolepsy was the mad- 
ness occasioned by the sight of the nymph flashing up from the fountain, 
scaring the traveller out of his senses ; and ** lymphatus " literally means 
"driven mad by the glare of water." Horace ascribes this effect to the 
fumes, or perhaps rather the sparkle, of the Mareotic wine, produced on 
the banks of Lake Mareotis, in the neighbourhood of Alexandria. 

+ " Liburnians," light swift-sailing vessels, which constituted a chief 
portion of Augustus's fleet at Actium. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXVII. 1 23 

Vix una sospes navis ab ignibus ; 
Mentemque lymphatam Mareotico* 
Redegit in veros timores 
Caesar, ab Italia volantem 

Remis adurgens, accipiter velut 
Molles columbas, aut leporem citus 
Venator in Campis nivalis 
H^monise, daret ut catenis 

Fatale monstrum : quae generosius 
Perire quaerens, nee muliebriter 
Expavit ensem, nee latentes 
Classe cita reparavit oras. 

Ausa et jacentem vis ere regiam 
Voltu sereno, fortis et asperas 
Tractare serpentes, ut atrum 
Corpore combiberet venenum ; 

Deliberata morte ferocior, 
Saevis Libumist scilicet invidens 
Privata deduci superbo 

Non humilis mulier triumpho. 



124 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XXXVIII. 

TO HIS WINE-SERVER. 

Boy, I detest the pomp of Persic fashions — 
Coronals wreathed with Hnden rind"^ displease me; 
Cease to explore each nook for some belated 
Rose of the autumn. 

Weave with plain myrtle nothing else, I bid thee ; 
Thee not, in serving, misbecomes the myrtle, 
Me not, in drinking, underneath the trellised 
Bowery vine-leaves.t 



* *' Philyra," the rind of the lime-tree used in elaborate garlands. 
+ "Sub arta vite" — "arta," "close," "embowering;" as in the 
trellised vine-arbours still common in Italy and parts of Germany. 



BOOK I. — ODE XXXVIII. 12$ 



Carm. XXXVIII. 

Persicos odi, puer, apparatus, 
Displicent nexae philyra* coronae ; 
Mitte sectari, rosa quo locorum 
Sera moretur. 

Simplici myrto nihil allabores 
Sedulus euro : neque te ministrum 
Dedecet myrtus neque me sub arta 
Vite bibentem.t 



126 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



BOOK IL— ODE I. 

TO ASINIUS POLLIO. 

Pollio was among Caesar's generals when he crossed the 
Rubicon, and at the battle of Pharsalia. After Caesar's 
death he joined M. Antony, and sided with him in the Pem- 
sian war. He remained neutral after the battle of Actium. 
Indeed he retired from an active share in public life after his 
victorious expedition against the Parthini, an Illyrian people 
bordering on Dalmatia, and it is to that victory which 
Horace refers as the " Dalmatian triumph." He then gave 

himself 

The civil feuds which from Metellus date. 
The causes, errors, conduct of the war. 
Fortune's capricious sport, 

The fatal friendships of august allies, 

And arms yet crusted with in expiate blood; — 
Such work is risked upon a perilous die : 
Thou tread'st on smouldering fires. 

By the false lava heaped on them concealed. 

Let for a while the tragic Muse forsake 
Her stage, till thou set forth the tale of Rome, 
Then the grand gift of song. 

With the Cecropian buskin, reassume, 

Pollio, in forum and in senate famed, 
Grief's bold defender, counsel's thoughtful guide, 
For whom the laurel, won 

In fields Dalmatian, blooms forth ever green. 



BOOK II. — ODE I. 127 

himself up to literature. His tragedies, of which there 
are no remains, are highly praised by Virgil, who says they 
were worthy of Sophocles. Porphyrion says he was the only 
one of his time who could write tragedy well. But the author 
of the ' Dialog, de Oratoribus ' asserts that both as a tragic 
writer and an orator his style was hard and dry. His history 
appears to have been in seventeen books; and it is after having 
heard him read a part of it (he is said to have introduced at 
Rome the custom of such readings to assemblies, more or less 
familiar, before publication) that we may suppose Horace to 
have written the ode, of which the date is uncertain. Pollio 
appears to have been one of the most truly illustrious, and 
certainly one of the most accomplished, personages of the 
Augustan era. 

Carm I. 

Motum ex Metello consule civicum, 
Bellique causas et vitia et modos, 
Ludumque Fortunse, gravesque 
Principum amicitias, et arma 

jSTondum expiatis uncta cruoribus, 
Periculosse plenum opus ale^, 
Tractas et incedis per ignes 
Suppositos cineri doloso. 

PauUum severae Musa tragcediae 
Desit theatris : mox ubi publicas 
Res ordinaris, grande munus 
Cecropio repetes cothurno, 

Insigne maestis prsesidium reis 
Et consulenti, Pollio, curiae, 
Cui laurus astemos honores 
Delmatico peperit triumpho. 



128 THE ODES OF HORACE. j 

Now, now, thou strik'st the ear with murmurous threat 

From choral horns — now the loud clarions blare ; ^ 

Lightnings from armour flashed, | 

Daunt charging war-steeds '^ and the looks of men I i 

Now, now, I seem to hear the mighty chiefs, ! 

Soiled with the dust which ornaments the brave, ; 

And see all earth subdued. 

Save the intrepid soul of Cato. Foiled 

Of her revenge, Juno, with all the gods, 
Quitting the Afric they had loved in vain, ' 

Back to Jugurtha's shade 

Brought funeral victims in his conqueror's sons. 

What field, made fertile by the Roman's gore. 

Attests not impious wars by ghastly mounds, j 

And by the crash, borne far | 

To Median ears, of falling Italy ? i 

What gulf, what stream, has boomed not with the wail 
Of dismal battle-storms ? What sea has hues : 

From Daunian carnage pure. 

What land has lacked the tribute of our blood ? 

Hush, wayward Muse, nor, playful strains laid by, 

Strive to recast the C can's t dirge-like hymn : ' 

In Dionaean grot, ' 

With me, seek measures tuned to lighter quill. A 



* "Fugaces terret equos." "Fugaces" here does not mean steeds 
in flight, but rather in charge — it applies to their swiftness. — POR- 
PHYRION. Orelli adopts that interpretation. 

+ "Cese — nenise." Horace does not confine this word to the usual 
sense of. a dirge ; but it suits the quahty of Simonides's poetry, which 
was of a severe and melancholy cast. — Macleane. 



BOOK 11. — ODE I. 129 

Jam nunc minaci murmure cornuum 
Perstringis aures, jam litui strepunt, 
Jam fulgor armorum fugaces 

Tenet equos'^ equitumque voltus. 

Audire magnos jam videor duces 
Non indecoro pulvere sordidos, 
Et cuncta terrarum subacta 

Praeter atrocem animum Catonis. 

Juno et deorum quisquis amicior 
Afris inulta cesserat impotens 
Tellure victorum nepotes 
Rettulit inferias Jugurthae. 

Quis non Latino sanguine pinguior 
Campus sepulcris impia proelia 
Testatur, auditumque Medis 
Hesperiae sonitum ruinae ? 

Qui gurges aut quae flumina lugubris 
Ignara belli ? quod mare Dauniag 
Non decoloravere c^des ? 
Quae caret ora cruore nostro ? 

Sed ne relictis, Musa procax, jocis, 
Ceae retractes munera neniae :t 
Mecum Dionaeo sub antro 
Quaere modos leviore plectro. 



130 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE II. 

TO C. SALLUSTIUS CRISPUS, GRAND-NEPHEW OF 
THE HISTORIAN. 

Many years before this ode, which is assigned to a.u.c. 
730, Horace satirises the frailties of this personage, who was 
then a young man (Sat. I. ii. 48). He was now second only 
to Maecenas in the favour of Augustus, to whom he subse- 
quently became the chief adviser. Tacitus gives a vigorous 
sketch of his character. He died a.d. 20. 

Yes-, Sallust, scorn the mere inactive metal ; 
There is no lustre of itself in silver, 
While niggard earth conceals ; from temperate usage 
Comes its sm.ooth polish. 

Known by the heart of father for his brethren, 
Time's latest age shall hear of Proculeius.* 
Him shall uplift, and on no waxen pinion, 
Fame, the survivor. 

Wider thy realm, a greedy soul subjected, 
Than if to Libya joined the farthest Gades, 
And either Carthage t to thy single service 
Ministered riches. 

The direful dropsy feeds itself, increasing ; 
To expel the thirst we must expel the causes, 
And healthier blood must chase the watery languor 
From the wan body. 

* Proculeius, a friend and near connection of Maecenas, with whom 
he is coupled by Juvenal (S. vii. 94) as a patron of letters, is said by the 
scholiasts to have divided his fortune with his brothers Licinius Murena, 
and Fannius Caepio, whose property had been despoiled in the civil wars. 
It is doubted, however, whether Licinius was his brother or cousin, and 



BOOK II. — ODE II. 131 



Carm. II. 

Nullus argento color est avaris 
Abdito terris, inimice lamnae 
Crispe Sallusti, nisi temperato 
Splendeat usu. 

Vivet extento Proculeius* sevo, 
Notus in fratres animi patemi ; 
Ilium aget penna metuente solvi 
Fama superstes. 

Latius regnes avidum domando 
Spiritum, quam si Libyam remotis 
Gadibus jungas, et uterque Poenust 
Serviat uni 

Crescit indulgens sibi dims hydrops, 
Nee sitim pellit, nisi causa morbi 
Fugerit venis, et aquosus albo 
Corpore languor. 



whether Csepio was related to him. Proculeius was among the Roman ■ 

knights on whom Augustus thought of bestowing Julia in marriage. 

t " Either Carthage" — viz., the African Carthage and her colonies in 
Spain. \ 



132 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Virtue, dissentient from the vulgar judgment, 
Strikes from the hst .of happy men Phraates, 
Even when restored to the great throne of Cyrus ; 
Virtue unteaches 

Faith in false doctrines mouthed out by the many. 
Holding safe only his realm, crown, and laurel, 
Whose sight nor blinks, nor swerves, though, heaped before it. 
Shine the world's treasures. 



BOOK 11. — ODE II. 133 

Readijtum Cyri solio Phraaten 
Dissidens plebi nunfero beatonim 
Eximit Virtus, populumque falsis 
Dedocet uti 

Vocibus; regnum et diadema tutum 
Deferens uni propriamque laurum, 
Quisquis ingentes oculo inretorto 
Spectat acervos. 



^ 



134 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE III. 

TO Q. DELLIUS. 

The commentator in Cruquius has GelHus for DeUius, 
assuming the person addressed to be L. Gellius Pophcola, 
brother of Messalla, the famous orator. But the common 
supposition is that the poem is addressed to Q. DelHus, to 
whose changeful and adventurous Hfe its admonitions would 
be very appropriate. Dellius sided first with Dolabella, 
then went over to Cassius, then to M. Antony and Cleo- 
patra. To Cleopatra he is said to have dictated the advice 

that 

With a mind undisturbed take life's good and life's evil, 
Temper grief from despair, temper joy from vainglory; 
For, through each mortal change, equal mind, 
O my Dellius, befits mortal-born. 

Whether all that is left thee of life be but trouble, 
Or, reclined at thine ease amid grassy recesses. 
Thy Falernian, the choicest, records 
How serenely the holidays glide. 

Say, for what do vast pine and pale poplar commingle 
Friendly boughs that invite to their welcoming shadow ? * 
Wherefore struggles and murmurs the rill 
Stayed from flight by a curve in the shore ?t 

Thither, lo, bid them bring thee the wine and the perfumes, 
And the blooms of the pleasant rose dying too swiftly ; 



* "The oldest and best MSS. have 'quo,' which signifies * to what 
purpose;' as, * Quo mihi fortunam, si non conceditur uti?' (Epp. I. v. 
12.) He seems to mean, 'What were the stream and the cool shade 
given for? Bring out the wine and let us drink.' "—Macleane. 



BOOK IL— ODE III. 135 

that she should rather subjugate M. Antony than be subju- 
gated by him. Not long before the battle of Actium, he 
gave some offence to Cleopatra, probably more serious than 
that which has been assigned — viz., a sarcasm on the 
meagreness of her entertainments — and deserted Antony 
for Augustus, by whom he was cordially received. Like so 
many other public men of his time he cultivated literature, 
and wTote a history (now lost) of the war against the Par- 
thians, in which he served under Antony. A terse sketch 
of his versatile career will be found in Estre, Pros. Horat., 
314. 

Carm. III. 

^quam memento rebus in arduis 
Servare mentem, non secus in bonis, 
Ab insolenti temperatam 
Laetitia, moriture Delli, 

Seu msestus omni tempore vixeris, 
Seu te in remoto gramine per dies 
Festos reclinatum bearis 
Interiore nota Falemi. 

Quo pinus ingens albaque populus 
Umbram hospitalem consociare amant 
Ramis?* Quid obliquo laborat 
Lympha fugax trepidare rivo ? 1 

Hue vina et unguenta et nimium breves 
Flores amoenas ferre jube rosae. 



Yonge, in his notes, cites parallels from English poets with the elegance 
of taste which characterises his edition. 

+ "Laborat — trepidare." " The stream struggles or labours to hurrj' 
on (trepidare), being obstructed by the curve in the bank (obliquo rivo), 
from which delay comes its pleasant murmur." — Orelli. 



136 THE ODES OF HORACE. 1 

While thy fortune, and youth,* and the woof j 
Of the Three Fatal Sisters allow. 

Woodlands dearly amassedt round the home proudly builded, ] 

Stately villa with walls laved by Tiber's dun waters,, \ 

Thou must quit ; and the wealth piled on high i 
Shall become the delight of thine heir.. 

For no victim has death either preference or pity, \ 
Be thy race from the king who first reigned o'er the Argive, j 
Or thy father a beggar, thy roof 

Yonder sky, — 'tis the same to the Grave. , 

Driven all to that fold ; J in one fatal urn shaken, ] 

Soon or late must leap forth the sure lot for an exile ) 
In the dark passage-boat which comes back 

To the sweet native land never more. ' 



* " ^tas," which Acron translates "youth," an interpretation ap- 
proved byEstre and Macleane. It more accurately, however, means "the 
time of life," including every period before that in which old age dead- 
ens the sense of such holiday enjoyments. Dellius was not young at the 
date of this poem ; but, at years more advanced, M. Antony was young 
enough to enjoy the present hour rather too much. 

f ** Coemptis saltibus." "Bought up," "extensive properties added 
together. " — Yonge. 

X *' Cogimur." " Gregis instar compellimur " — " we are driven like 
sheep." — Orelli. 



BOOK 11. — ODE III. 137 

Dum res et setas * et Sororum 
Fila trium patiuntur atra. 

Cedes coemptis saltibus,t et domo, 
Villaque, flavus quam Tiberis lavit, 
Cedes, et exstmctis in altum 
Divitiis potietur heres. 

Divesne prisco natus ab Inacho, 
Nil interest, an pauper et infima 
De gente sub divo moreris, 
Victima nil miserantis Orci. 

Omnes eodem cogimur;J omnium 
Versatur urna serius ocius 

Sors exitura, et nos in aetemum 
Exilium impositura cumbse. 



138 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE IV. ; 

TO XANTHIAS PHOCEUS. 

Xanthias Phoceus is evidently a fictitious designation. i 
Xanthias is a Greek name, and given by Aristophanes to I 
slaves; and Phoceus characterises the person named as a 

Phocian. 

Nay, if thou lov'st thy handmaid, Xanthias, blush not : ^ 

Long since the slave Briseis, with white beauty, 
O'ermastering him who ne'er before had yielded,* 

Conquered Achilles ; l 

So, too, the captive form of fair Tecmessa | 

Conquered her captor Telamonian Ajax ; 
And a wronged maiden, in the midst of triumph. 
Fired Agamemnon, 

What time had fallen the barbarian forces ] 

Before the might of the Thessalian victor, ] 

And Hector's loss made easy to worn Hellas i 

Troy's mighty ruin. \ 

How dost thou know but what thy fair-haired Phyllis ' 

May make thee son-in-law to splendid parents ? 1 

Doubtless she mourns the wrong to race and hearth-gods 1 
Injured, but regal. 

Believe not thy beloved of birth plebeian ; 1 

A girl so faithful, so averse from lucre, ; 

Could not be born of an ignoble mother t 

Whom thou wouldst blush for. \ 

That lovely face, those arms, those tapering ankles — j 

Nay, in my praises never doubt mine honour : i 

The virtuous man, who rounds the age of forty. 
Hold unsuspected. 

* * * Insolentem — Achillem." I agree with Yonge in his suggestion i 
that " insolentem" means *' not wont to be moved." ! 



BOOK II. — ODE IV. 139 

Phocian. The date of the ode is clearly a.u.c. 729, or the 
beginning of 730, when Horace, bom a.u.c. 689, was just 
concluding his eighth lustre. 



Carm. IV. 

Ne sit ancillae tibi amor pudori, 
Xanthia Phoceu ! Prius insolentem''" 
Serva Briseis niveo colore 
Movit Achillem ; 

Movit Ajacem Telamone natum 
Forma captivae dominum Tecmessae ; 
Arsit Atrides medio in triumpho 
Virgine rapta, 

Barbarae postquam cecidere tumiae 
Thessalo victore, et ademptus Hector 
Tradidit fessis leviora toUi 
Pergama Grais. 

Nescias, an te generum beati 
Phyllidis flavae decorent parentes : 
Regium certe genus et Penates 
Maeret iniquos. 

Crede non illam tibi de scelesta 
Plebe dilectam ; neque sic fidelem, 
Sic lucro aversam, potuisse nasci 
Matre pudenda. 

Brachia et voltum teretesque suras 
Integer laudo ; fuge suspicari, 
Cujus octavum trepidavit aetas 
Claudere lustrum. 



140 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE V. 

TO GABINIUS. 

This poem is designated variously in theMSS.as "Lalage," 
" To the Lover of Lalage," &c. According to one early MS. 
(the Zurich), it is inscribed to Gabinius. But even Estre 
cannot tell us who Gabinius was, though Orelli conjectures 
him to have been son or grandson to A. Gabinius, Cicero's 
enemy. The poem is of very general application, and the 
leading idea is expressed with great elegance and spirit. 

Not yet can she bear, with neck supple, the yoke, 
Not yet with another submit to be paired ; 
Immature for the duties of mate, 
And the fiery embrace of the bull. 

Thine heifer confines all her heart to green fields ; 
Now pausing to slake summer heats in the stream, 
Now with steerlings yet younger at play 
Midst the sallows that drip on the shore. 

Till ripe, do not long for the fruit of the grape ; 
Anon varied Autumn shall deepen its hues, 
And empurple the clusters that now 
Do but pallidly peep from the leaf : 

Anon, 'tis thyself she will seek ; fervent Time 
Speeds on, adding quick to her youth's crowning flower 
Blooming seasons subtracted from thine ; 
Then shall Lalage glow for a spouse ; 

And then not so lovely the coy Pholoe, 
Nor Chloris resplendent with shoulders of snow, 
As a moon in the stillness of night 
Shining pure on the calm of a sea; 



BOOK II. — ODE V. 141 



Carm. V. 

Nondum subacta ferre jugum valet 
Cervice, nondum munia comparis 
yEquare, nee tauri ruentis 
In venerem tolerare pondus. 

Circa virentes est animus tuse 
Campos juvencse, nunc fluviis gravem 
Solantis aestum, nunc in udo 
Ludere cum vitulis salicto 

Praegestientis. Tolle cupidinem 
Immitis uvse : jam tibi lividos 
Distinguet Auctumnus racemos 
Purpureo varius colore. 

Jam te sequetur : currit enim ferox 
^tas, et illi, quos tibi dempserit, 
Apponet annos ; jam proterva 
Fronte petet Lalage maritum : 

Dilecta, quantum non Pholoe fugax, 
Non Chloris albo sic humero nitens, 
Ut pura nocturno renidet 
Luna mari, Cnidiusve Gyges, 



142 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Nor even Cnidian Gyges, whom, placed amid girls, 
No guest the most shrewd could distinguish from them, 
So redundant the flow of his locks, 
And his face so ambiguously fair. 



BOOK II. — ODE V. 143 

Quem si puellanim insereres choro, 
Mire sagaces falleret hospites 
Discrimen obscurum solutis 
Crinibus ambiguoque voltu. 



144 THE ODES OF HORACE. I 

i 

ODE VI. I 

TO SEPTIMIUS. ' 

1 

It is a reasonable conjecture, though nothing more, that 
this is the same Septimius whom Horace introduces to 
Tiberius, Ep. 1. ix., and whom Augustus mentions in a letter 
to Horace, preserved in the life attributed to Suetonius. . 
The scholiast in Cruquius says that he was a Roman knight, i 

and 

To the world's end thou'dst go with me, Septimius, \ 
View tribes Cantabrian, for our yoke too savage ; 

And barbarous Syrtes, where the Moorish billow j 

Whirls, ever-seething ; \ 

No, my Septimius, may mine age close calmly I 

In that mild Tibur by the Argive founded ; | 

There, tired of ranging lands and seas, and warfare, "\ 

Reach my last limit. i 

Or if such haven the hard Fates deny me, 
Thee will I seek, Galaesus, gentle river, j 

Dear to flocks skin-clad;^ and thy rural kingdom, i 

Spartan Phalanthus.t 

Out of all earth most smiles to me that corner. 

Where the balmed honey yields not to Hymettus, [ 

Where olives vie with those whose silvery verdure \ 

Gladdens Venafnim ; j 



* " Pellitis ovibus." " Pellitis" is supposed by Orelli and others to 
refer to the hides with which the fleeces of the sheep were protected 
from thorns and brambles and atmospheric changes. 

+ Tarentum, of which Phalanthus, the leader of the emigrant Par- 
theniae, after the first Messenian war, got possession. , 



BOOK 11. — ODE VI. 145 

and had been fellow - soldier with Horace ; that a Titius 
Septimius wrote lyrics and tragedies in the time of Augustus; 
and there are those who make the Septimius of the ode 
identical with the Titius of whom Horace speaks in his 
Epistle to Julius Florus, lib. i. 3, v. 9 et seq. All this is 
uncertain : not less uncertain is the date at which the ode 
was composed. 

Carm. VI. 

Septimi, Gades aditure mecum et 
Cantabrum indoctum juga ferre nostra, et 
Barbaras Syrtes, ubi Maura semper 
^stuat unda, 

Tibur Argeo positum colono 
Sit meas sedes utinam senectae, 
Sit modus lasso maris et viarum 
Militiseque. 

Unde si Parcse prohibent iniquse,. 
Dulce pellitis* ovibus Galaesi 
Flumen et regnata petam Laconi 
Rura Phalantho.t 

Ille terrarum mihi prseter omnes 
Angulus ridet, ubi non Hymetto 
Mella decedunt, viridique certat 
Baca Venafro ; 



146 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Where Jove bestows long springs and genial winters, 
And Anion's mount, friend to a fertile Bacchus,. 
Never has cause the purple of Falemian 
Clusters to envy. 

Both thee and me that place, those blessed hill-tops. 
Invite; thy tear shall there bedew the relics - 
Of thy lost poet-friend, while yet there lingers 
Warmth in the ashes. 



BOOK II. — ODE VI. 147 

Ver ubi longum tepidasque praebet 
Juppiter bnimas, et amicus Aulon 
Fertili Baccho minimum Falernis 
Invidet uvis. 

Ille te mecum locus et beatae 
Postulant arces ; ibi tu calentem 
Debita sparges lacrima favillam 
Vatis amici. 



148 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE VII. 

TO POMPEIUS VARUS. 

The person addressed in this charming ode must not be 
confounded with the rich Pompeius Grosphus, to whom the 
1 6th Ode, Book 11. , is inscribed. 

O Pompeius, thou chiefest and first of my comrades, 
Fellow-soldier with me, when our leader was Brutus, 
In danger's last deadly extreme ;* 

Who, back to thine own country gods. 

To thine own Tuscan skies and the rights of the Roman 
Hath restored thee, old friend ? Ah, how often 
Have we whiled loitering days o'er gay cups. 
Our wreathed locks bright with Araby's balms ? 

With thee did I share field and flight of Philippi, 
Where I left, not too bravely, behind me, my buckler, t 
When valour was broken, and tongues 
That threatened so loudly, licked dust. . 

Swiftly me the god Mercury J bore through the foemen, 
Buoyed aloft in thick cloud — all secure, yet all trembling- 
Thee the whirlpool of battle again 
Dragged back in the roar of its surge. 



* " Tempus in ultimum " — " in summum vitae discrimen" (in extremest 
danger of life). See Catullus, 64, 151 — " Supremo in tempore ; " et v. 
169 — " Extremo tempore sseva fors," &c. — Orelli. 

+ " Relicta non bene parmula ; 
Cum fracta virtus, et minaces 
Turpe solum tetigere mento." 
Horace's modest confession of having left his shield behind him at 
Philippi has been very harshly perverted into a proof of cowardice — 



BOOK II. — ODE VII. 149 



Carm. VII. 

O saepe mecum tempus in ultimum'^ 
Deducte, Bruto militia duce, 
Quis te redonavit Quiritem 
Dis patriis Italoque cselo, 

Pompei meorum prime sodalium ? 
Cum quo morantem ssepe diem mero 
Fregi coronatus nitentes 
Malobathro Syrio capillos. 

Tecum Philippos et celerem fugam 
Sensi, relicta non bene parmula ; 
Cum fracta virtus, et minaces 
Turpe solum tetigere mento.f 

Sed me per hostes Mercurius t celer 
Denso paventem sustulit acre ; 
Te rursus in bellum resorbens 
Unda fretis tulit sestuosis. 



probably the last accusation to which a soldier who had shared with 
his friend the extremest dangers of Brutus would be fairly subjected. 
The accusation derived from his own playful reference is confuted by 
the lines that immediately follow : — When valour was broken, and 
those who had most menaced touched ground with their chins — t.e., 
as Orelli construes it, begged for quarter, than which flight itself was 
more honourable. In fact, Brutus himself advised flight. . We much 
prefer this interpretation to that which would make Horace sneer 
at those haughty boasters for being slain. Horace was the last man to 
sneer at the soldier who fell bravely in battle, while he has specially 
singled for contempt the soldier who asks for quarter — (Lib. III. Ode 
V. i. 36.) 

X Mercury was the tutelary god of poets, whom, according to astro- 
logers, his planet still favours. In C. iii. 4, 26, Horace ascribes his 
preservation, not to Mercury, but to the Muses. 



I50 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Give to Jove, then, the feast that thou ow'st to his mercy; 
Worn with warfare so lengthened rest under my laurel, 
Nor will I allow thee to spare 

The casks I have destined for thee. 

Ho, slaves, brim the cups,* Egypt's cups smooth and wide- 
lipped. 
With the soft Massic wine which lulls care in oblivion ; 
Pour sweets from large shells. AVho the first 
Fresh parsley or myrtle will twine ? 

Whom will Venus t befriend in the cast for our wine-king? — 
As for me, I'm prepared to out-tipple a Thracian : 
Ah, how sweet to drown reason in joy. 

For the friend whom I welcome once more ! 



* "Ciboria," cups shaped like the pod of the Egyptian bean. **Ore 
superius lato, inferius angusto." — Orelli. 

t " Quern Venus arbitrum dicet bibendi." Venus was the highest 
throw on the dice, Canis the lowest. 



BOOK II. — ODE VII. 151 

Ergo obligatam redde Jovi dapem 
Longaque fessum militia latus 
Depone sub launi mea, nee 
Parce cadis tibi destinatis. 



Oblivioso levia Massico 
Ciboria * exple ; funde capacibus 
Unguenta de conchis. Quis udo 
Deproperare apio coronas 

Curatve myrto? quem Venus f arbitrum 
Dicet bibendi ? Non ego sanius 
Bacchabor Edonis : recepto 
Dulce mihi furere est amico. 



152 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE VIII. 

TO BARINE. 

Some of the MSS., upon what authority is unknown, pre- 
fix Julia to Barine. Bentley objects to the name as being 
neither Greek nor Latin. Orehi shrewdly suggests that 
there were plenty of gay ladies at Rome who were of other 
nations besides Greece and Rome. The name, however, is 

very 

If for thy vows forsworn the least infliction 
Came from the gods ; were one white tooth less pearl-like, 
One very nail less rosy, then, Barine, 
I might believe thee. 

But in proportion as that head perfidious 
Thou doom'st to Orcus, brighter shines thy beauty, 
And grows still more the universal theme of 
Youthful adorers. 

Clearly with thee it prospers to be perjured : 
Oaths " by a mother's urn," " night's starry silence," 
" All heaven," " the deathless gods," obtain thee blessings 
Only when broken. 

At all this treason Venus laughs, then ? laugh out 
The very nymphs,'^ so truthful, and fierce Cupid, 
Sharpening his fiery arrows on a whetstone, 
Red with men's heart-blood. 

.. * " Simplices Nymphse " — "ab omni fraude aliense." — Orelli. 



BOOK 11. — ODE VIII. 153 

very likely invented by Horace himself — as no doubt Cinara 
was — and may possibly be an adaptation from Ba^mg^ a kind 
of fish. There is not a line in the poem to justify the wild 
assumption of some commentators that Horace himself was 
in love with Barine, whoever she was. Judging by internal 
evidence, it seems to me that a real person was certainly 
thus addressed, and in a tone which to such a person would 
have been the most exquisite flattery ; and as certainly that 
the person is not so addressed by a lover. 



Carm. VIII. 

\ 
Ulla si juris tibi pejerati 

Poena, Barine, nocuisset unquam, ; 

Dente si nigro fieres vel uno ' 

Turpior ungui, ^ 

i 

Crederem. Sed tu, simul obligasti j 

Perfidum votis caput, enitescis i 

Pulchrior multo, juvenumque prodis \ 
Publica cura. 

Expedit matris cineres opertos ' 

Fallere, et toto taciturna noctis < 

Signa cum caelo, gelidaque divos ' 

Morte carentes. 

I 

Ridet hoc, inquam, Venus ipsa, rident | 

Simplices Nymphae,* ferus et Cupido \ 

Semper ardentes acuens sagittas j 

Cote cruenta. 1 



j 

I 

154 THE ODES OF HORACE. ' 

Meanwhile, new youths grow up beneath thy thraldom ; 
Grow up new slaveries ; and the earlier lovers 
Threaten each day to quit thy faithless threshold — 1 

Threaten, and throng there. j 



For their raw striplings tremble all the mothers, 
And all the fathers of a thrifty temper ; 
And, as a gale retarding home-bound husbands,* 
Weeping brides fear thee. 



* * ' Tua ne retardet 
Aura maritos." 
There are many conjectures as to the sense of the word "aura" in this 
passage, for which see Orelli's note. Yonge interprets it '* a metaphor 
for influence." 



BOOK II. — ODE VIII. 155 

Adde, quod pubes tibi crescit omnis, I 

Servitus crescit nova, nee priores 

Impiae tectum dominae relinquunt i 

Saepe minati. i 

Te suis matres metuunt juvencis, i 

Te senes parci miserseque nuper 

Virgines nuptse, tua ne retardet j 

Aura* maritos. 

1 






156 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE IX. 

TO C. VALGIUS RUFUS. 

(yin Consolation }j 

This Valgius, of consular rank, appears to have been 
much esteemed in his time as a poet. He wrote elegies and 
epigrams, and had even a high claim to the pretensions of 
an epic poet, according to the author of the ' Panegyric 
on Messala' — 

" Est tibi, qui posset magnis se accingere rebus, 
Valgius, setemo propior non alter Homero." 

Horace might therefore well call upon him to lay aside his 
elegiac complaints and sing the triumphs of Augustus. He 

is 

'Tis not always the fields are made rough by the rains, 

'Tis not always the Caspian is harried by storm ; j 

Neither is it each month in the year j 

That the ice stands inert on the shores of Armenia ; i 

Nor on lofty Garganus the loud-groaning oaks . 

Wrestle, rocked to and fro with the blasts of the north, \ 



Nor the ash-trees droop widowed of leaves. 1 

O my friend, O my Valgius, shall grief last for ever ? j 

Yet thy heart in its yearning for ever pursues j 

The loved and lost Mystes ; the star of the eve, | 

And the sunrise which chases the star, 1 

Find thy love still lamenting the loss of thy Mystes. ] 

But the old man, who three generations lived through, ' 

Did not for Antilochus mourn all his years : i 

Nor for Troilus, nipped in his bloom, \ 

Flowed for ever the tears of his parents and sisters. , 



BOOK 11. — ODE IX. 157 

is said also to have written in prose on the nature of plants, 
&c. Torrentius endeavours, " nullo argumento," to distin- 
guish between C. Valgius Rufus the consul and prose-writer, 
and T. Valgius Rufus the poet. The Mystes whose loss 
Valgius deplores must have been a slave, or of servile 
origin, as the name denotes — not, as Dacier and Sanadon 
suppose, the son of Valgius. — See Estre, p. 457. 



Carm. IX. 

Non semper imbres nubibus hispidos 
Manant in agros, aut mare Caspium 
Vexant inaequales procellae 
Usque ; nee Armeniis in oris. 

Amice Valgi, stat glacies iners 
Menses per omnes, aut Aquilonibus 
Querceta Gargani laborant, 
Et foliis viduantur orni : 

Tu semper urges flebilibus modis 
Mysten ademptum, nee tibi Vespero 
Surgente decedunt amores 
Nee rapidum fugiente Solem. 

At non ter aevo functus amabilem 
Ploravit omnes Antilochum senex 
Annos, nee impubem parentes 
Troilon aut Phrygiae sorores 



158 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Wean thy heart then at last from these memories too soft, 
Let us chant the fresh trophies our Caesar has won, 
Linking on, to the nations subdued. 

Bleak Niphates"^ all ice-locked, the Mede's haughty 
river, 

Now submissively humbling the crest of its waves ; 
While the edict of Rome has imprisoned the Scyths, 
In the narrow domain of their steppes, 

And the steed of each rider halts reined at the borders. 



* " Rigidum Niphaten, 
Medumque flumen." 
That Niphates was the name of a mountain-range east of the Tigris is 
certain ; whether there was also a river of that name is much disputed, 
though Lucan and Juvenal take it for granted. Possibly the Tigris, 
which, according to Strabo, rises on the mountain-range of Niphates, 
may be the river here meant. There was a small river called Medus 
which flowed into the Araxes, but this was too insignificant for the 
mention Horace makes of the '* Medum flumen," even if he knew of its 
existence ; and most of the later commentators concur in thinking the 
river thus designated was the Euphrates. 



BOOK II. — ODE IX. 159 

Flevere semper. Desine mollium 
Tandem querellarum, et potius nova 
Cantemus August! tropaea 

Caesaris, et rigidum Niphaten,''^ 

Medumque flumen, gentibus additura 
Victis, minores volvere vertices, 
Intraque praescriptum Gelonos 
Exiguis equitare campis. 



l6o THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE X. 

TO LICINIUS. 

Licinius Murena was the son of the Murena whom Cicero 
defended, subsequently adopted by A. Terentius Varro. 
He was then called A. Terentius Varro Murena. Maecenas 
married his sister ; and Horace speaks of him subsequently 
(C. iii. 19) as one of the College of Augurs. . The caution 
to discretion and moderation contained in this ode has a 

melancholy 

Licinius, wouldst thou steer life's wiser voyage, 
Neither launch always into deep mid-waters, 
Nor hug the shores, and, shrinking from the tempest, 
Hazard the quicksand. 

He who elects the golden mean of fortune. 
Nor where dull squalor rots the time-worn hovel. 
Nor where fierce envy storms the new-built palace, 
Makes his safe dwelling. 

The wildest winds rock most the loftiest pine-trees, 
The heaviest crash is that of falling towers. 
The spots on earth most stricken by the lightning 
Are its high places. 

The mind well trained to cope with either fortune. 
Takes hope in adverse things and fear in prosperous. 
Deforming winters are restored or banished 
By the same Father. 

If to-day frown, not therefore frowns to-morrow. 
His deadly bow not always bends Apollo, 
His hand at times the silent muse awakens 
With the sweet harpstring. 



BOOK II. — ODE X. l6l 

melancholy interest as that of a foreboding. He was put to 
death despite the intercession of Maecenas and Proculeius, 
on the charge, whether true or false, of having entered with 
Fannius Coepio and others into a conspiracy against Au- 
gustus. As his death occurred a.u.c. 732, this ode must 
have been composed before that date. Dio speaks of the 
unrestrained licence he allowed to his tongue, and his words 
may have incriminated him more than his actions, the guilt 
of which Dio leaves doubtful. 

Carm. X. 

Rectius vives, Licini, neque altum 
Semper urgendo, neque, dum procellas 
Cautus horrescis, nimium premendo 
Litus iniquum. 

Auream quisquis mediocritatem 

Diligit, tutus caret obsoleti 
Sordibus tecti, caret invidenda 
Sobrius aula. 

Saepius ventis agitatur ingens 
Pinus, et celsae graviore casu 
Decidunt turres, feriuntque summos 
Fulgura montes. 

Sperat infestis, metuit secundis 
Alteram sortem bene praeparatum 
Pectus. Informes hiemes reducit 
Juppiter, idem 

Summovet. Non, si male nunc, et olim 
Sic erit : quondam cithara tacentem 
Suscitat Musam, neque semper arcum 
Tendit Apollo. 

L 



l62 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

In life's sore straits brace and display thy courage.* 
Boldness is wisdom then : as wisely timid 
When thy sails swell with winds too strongly fav'ring, 
Heed, and contract them. 



* *' Animosus atque fortis appare" — not only be^ but show thyself, 
courageous. 



BOOK 11. — ODE X. 163 

Rebus angustis animosus atque 
Fortis appare f sapienter idem 
Contrahes vento nimium secundo 
Turgida vela: 



1 64 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XL 

TO QUINTIUS HIRPINUS. 

Who this Hirpinus was we do not know. Orelli con- 
siders it probable that he is the Quintius to whom Ep. 
I. xvi. is addressed. But Macleane observes " that the 
latter appears to have been younger than the former, whom 
Horace addresses (v. 15) as if he were a contemporary." 
But the question is immaterial ; for we know no more about 
the Quintius of the Epistle than the Hirpinus of the Ode. 

What the warlike Cantabrian or Scythian, 
From ourselves by an ocean disparted, 
Take it into their heads to devise, 

Do not class with the questions that press. 

Be not over-much anxious, Hirpinus, 
For the things of a hfe that needs little ; 
See how Beauty recedes from our side 

With her beardless "^ twin playfellow Youth. 

Grizzled Age, dry and sapless, conies chasing 
Frolic Loves and the balm of light Slumbers ; 
Not the same glory lasts to the flower. 
Not the same glowing face to the moon : 

Why to fathom the counsels eternal 
Strain the Mind without strength for such labour ? 
Why not rather, yon plane-tree beneath. 
Or this pine, fling us carelessly down, 

While we may j letting locks whiten under 
Syrian nard and the fragrance of roses. 
Drink ! Evius dispels eating cares. 
Ho ! which of you, boys, will assuage 

This Falernian in yon running waters ? 
Which entice that sequestered jade, Lyde,t 
With her iv'ry lute, and with her locks, 
Like a Spartan maid's, simply knit back. 



BOOK II. — ODE XL 1 65 



Carm. XI. 

Quid bellicosus Cantaber et Scythes, 
Hirpine Quinti, cogitet Hadria 
Divisus objecto, remittas 

Qu^rere : nee trepides in usum 

Poscentis s&vi pauca. Fugit retro 
Levis * Juventas, et Decor ; arida 
Pellente lascivos Amores 

Canitie facikmque Somnum. 

Non semper idem floribus est honor 
Vernis ; neque uno Luna rubens nitet 
Voltu : quid aetemis minorem 
Consiliis animum fatigas ? 

Cur non sub aha vel platano vel hac 
Pinu jacentes sic temere, et rosa 
Canos odorati capiUos, 

Dum hcet, Ass}Tiaque nardo 

Potamus uncti ? Dissipat Evius 
Curas edaces. Quis puer ocius 
Restinguet ardentis Falemi 
Pocula praetereunte lympha ? 

Quis devium scortum eHciet domo 
Lyden ? t Eburna, die age, cum lyra 
^ Maturet, in comptum Lacsense 

IMore comas reUgata nodum. 

* ** Levis" here means " beardless, " as in " Levis Agyieu, " Book IV. 
Ode vi. 28. 

+ " Quis devium scortum ehciet domo 
Lyden ? " 
It need scarcely be said the word "scortum" is not used here in its most 
uncomplimentary sense. " Devium " — ** one who lives out of the way," 
as Ovid, Heroid., iu 118, *' Et cecinit maestum devia carmen avis." — 
Orelli, Macleane. 



1 66 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XII. 

TO M^CENAS. 

The Licymnia (or, as the schoHasts spell it, Licinia) cele- 
brated in this ode was most probably Terentia, the wife of 
Maecenas ; and if so, the poem was evidently Avritten within 
a few years after their marriage. It is not pleasant to think 
that the wedded happiness so charmingly described was of 
brief duration, and that the faults laid to the charge of the 
lady embittered the life of Maecenas at its close. Some of 

the 

Ask no high-sounding themes from this lute's relaxed num- 
bers. 
Suited neither to strains of long wars with Numantia, 
Nor of Hannibal dire, nor of waters Sicilian 

Which Carthage made red with her blood ; 

Nor of Lapithae fierce, and the great drunken Centaur ; 
Nor of Earth's giant sons, overborne by Alcides, 
Threat'ning perils that shook to its starry foundations 
Old Saturn's refulgent abode. 

And far better thy prose than my verse, O Maecenas, 

hall record, in grave story, the battles of Caesar, 
And the necks of the kings who have loftily threatened 
His Rome, to pass under her yoke. 

Me the Muse has enjoined for the theme of my praises, 
Thy lady Licymnia — ^her dulcet-voiced singings. 
And the sunshine of eyes that illumine her beauty. 
And the loving heart true to thine own. 

Graced alike, whether joining at home in the dances, 
Or contesting the palm in gay wit's playful skirmish, 
Or amid holy sports on the feast-day of Dian, 
With virgins entwining the arm. 



BOOK II. — ODE XII. 167 

the commentators have, however, doubted whether Horace 
could have ventured to speak so freely, as in the concluding 
lines, of a Roman matron of rank so illustrious as Terentia, 
and would therefore assume Licymnia to have been rather 
the mistress than the wife of Maecenas. This supposition 
is incompatible with the description of Licymnia joining in 
the festivals of Diana; and probably Horace sufficiently 
preserved such respect to the wife of his patron as the 
manners of the time required by substituting a feigned 
name for her own. 

Carm. XII. 

Nolis longa ferae bella Numantiae, 
Nee dirum Hannibalem, nee Siculum mare 
Poeno purpureum sanguine, mollibus 
Aptari citharae modis, 

Nee ssevos Lapithas, et nimium mero 
Hylaeum, domitosque Herculea manu 
Telluris juvenes, unde periculum 
Fulgens contremuit domus 

Saturni veteris ; tuque pedestribus 
Dices historiis proelia Caesaris, 
Maecenas, melius ductaque per vias 
Regum colla minacium. 

Me dulces dominae Musa LicjTnniae 
Cantus, me voluit dicere lucidum 
Fulgentes oculos et bene mutuis 
Fidum pectus amoribus ; 

Quam nee ferre pedem dedecuit choris, 
Nee certare joco, nee dare brachia 
Ludentem nitidis virginibus, sacro 
Dianae Celebris die. 



1 68 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Say, for all that Achaemenes boasted of treasure, 
All the wealth which Mygdonia gave Phrygia in tribute. 
All the stores of all Araby — say, wouldst thou barter 
One lock of Licymnia's bright hair ? — 

When at moments she bends down her neck to thy kisses, 
Or declines them with coy but not cruel denial ; . 
Rather pleased if the prize be snatched oif by the spoiler, 
Nor slow in reprisal sometimes. 



BOOK II. — ODE XII. 169 

Num tu, quae tenuit dives Achaemenes, 
Aut pinguis Phrygis Mygdonias opes 
Permutare velis crine Licymniae, 
Plenas aut Arabum domos ? — 



Dum flagrantia detorquet ad oscula 
Cervicem, aut facili saevitia negat, 
Quae poscente magis gaudeat eripi, 
Interdum rapere occupet. 



I/O THE ODES OF HORACE. 

I 
O D E XIII. ! 

TO A TREE. : 

I 

Few of the odes are more remarkable than this for the ; 
wonderful ease with which Horace rises from humorous 
pleasantry into the higher regions of poetic imagination. < 
His escape from the falling tree seems to have made a deep 
and lasting impression on him. The more probable date of ' 
the poem is a.u.c. 728, or perhaps 729. 

Evil-omened the day whosoever first planted, 
Sacrilegious his hand whosoever first raised thee, 

To become the perdition of races unborn, j 

And a stain on the country, thou infamous tree. i 

Ah ! I well may believe that the man was a monster, j 

Had at night stabbed his hearth-guest, and strangled his ■ 

father, | 

Dealt in poisons of Colchis — committed, in short, | 

Every crime the most fell which the thought can con- 1 

ceive ; — , 

He, the wretch, who thus set thee malign in my meadow, ' 
Felon-traitor of wood, arboretal assassin, ' 

With remorseless design coming down unawares 

On the head of an innocent master like me. ^ 

i 
Who can hope to be safe ? who sufficiently cautious ? 1 

Guard himself as he may, every moment's an ambush. ] 

Thus the sailor of Carthage alarmed at a squall J 

In the Euxine, may find his least danger at sea. ^ 

i 

Thus the soldier of Rome mails his breast to the Parthian, ' 
And believes himself safe if secure from an arrow ; 

And the Parthian, in flying Rome's dungeon ""' and chains, 
Fondly thinks that in flight he escapes from the grave ! i 



BOOK 11. — ODE XIII. 171 



Carm. XIII. 

Ille et nefasto te posuit die, 
Quicunque primum, et sacrilega manu 
Produxit, arbos, in nepotum 
Pemiciem opprobriumque pagi; 

Ilium et parentis crediderim sui 
Fregisse cervicem, et penetralia 
Sparsisse nocturno cruore 
Hospitis ; ille venena Colclia 

Et quidquid usquam concipitur nefas 
Tractavit, agro qui statuit meo 
Te triste lignum, te caducum 
In domini caput immerentis. 

Quid quisque vitet, nunquam homini satis 
Cautum est in horas : navita Bosporum 
Pcenus perhorrescit, neque ultra 
Caeca timet aliunde fata ; 

Miles sagittas et celerem fugam 
Parthi, catenas Parthus et Italum 
Robur ; * sed improvisa leti 
Vis rapuit rapietque gentes. 



* " Italum robur." Orelli gives the weight of his authority in favour 
of interpreting "robur" as the Roman prison ("Tullianum "), an inner 
cell in which malefactors were placed, and in which the State captives, 
as Jugurtha, were also sometimes immured. Yonge adopts the same in- 
terpretation. Dillenburger translates it in the simple sense of the strength 
or power of Italy, which Macleane also favours. 



172 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

But the death most to fear is the death we least look for- 
Ah ! how near was I seeing dark Proserpine's kingdom, 
And the Judge of the Dead and the Seats of the Blest, 
Sappho wailing melodious of loves unretumed 






Ay, and thee, too, with strains sounding larger, Alcaeus, 
To thy golden shell chanting of hardships in shipwreck. 
And of hardships in exile, and hardships in war. 
While the Shadows admiringly hearken to both ; 

Due to either is silence as hushed as in temples, 
But more presses the phantom mob, shoulder on shoulder, 
Drinking into rapt ears the grand song, when it swells 
With the burthen of battles and tyrants o'erthrown. 

What wonder ? since, spelled by the voice of the charmer. 
The dark hell-dog his hundred heads fawningly crouches. 
And the serpents that writhe interweaved in the locks 
Of the Furies, repose upon terrible brows ; 

And Prometheus himself and the Father of Pelops, 
By the dulcet delight are beguiled from their torture. 
While the hand of Orion the arrow lets fall. 
And the spectres of Hons unheeded flit on. 



BOOK II. — ODE XIII. 173 

Quam pasne furvae regna Proserpinae, 
Et judicantem vidimus ^acum, 
Sedesque discretas piorum, et 
Aeoliis fidibus querentem 

Sappho puellis de popularibus f 
Et te sonantem plenius aureo, 
Alcaee, plectro dura navis, 
Dura fugse mala, dura belli ! 

Utrumque sacro digna silentio 
Mirantur Umbrae die ere ; sed magis 
Pugnas et exactos tyrannos 

Densum humeris bibit aure volgus. 

Quid mirum ? ubi illis carminibus stupens 
Demittit atras belua centiceps 
Aures, et intorti capillis 

Eumenidum recreantur angues ; 

Quin et Prometheus et Pelopis parens 
Dulci laborum decipitur sono ; 
Nee curat Orion leones 
Aut timidos agitare lyncas. 



* " Querentem 
Sappho puellis de popularibus." 
" Incertum autem est quid quereretur." — Estre, Horat. Prosop., 26. 
Estre cites the various interpretations, and inclines to that of the com- 
mentators in Cruquius — viz., Sappho complained of the girls of her 
country that they loved Phaon whom she loved. This is, at all events, 
the most agreeable conjecture. Welcker has written with ingenious 
eloquence in vindication of Sappho's memory from the scandal, "quod 
nimis diu ei adhoesit." 



1/4 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIV. 

TO -POSTUMUS. 

Who this Postumus may have been is, in spite of the 
various conjectures of various commentators, as uncertain 
as, happily, it is immaterial. It is, at all events, an agree- 
able supposition that he may be identical with the Postumus 

whom 

Postumus, Postumus, the years glide by us, 
Alas ! no piety delays the wrinkles, 
Nor old age imminent. 

Nor the indomitable hand of Death. 

Though thrice each day a hecatomb were offered, 
Friend, thou couldst soften not the tearless Pluto, 
Encoiling Tityus vast, 

And Geryon, triple giant, with sad waves — 

Waves over which we all of us must voyage. 
All whosoe'er the fruits of earth have tasted ; 
Whether that earth we ruled 

As kings, or served as drudges of its soil. 

Vainly we shun Mars and the gory battle. 
Vainly the Hadrian hoarse with stormy breakers, 
Vainly, each autumn's fall. 

The sicklied airs through which the south wind sails.* 

Still the dull-winding ooze of slow Cocytus, 
The ill-famed Danaids, and, to task that ends not 
Sentenced, bolides ; 

These are the sights on which we all must gaze. 

* "Auster," "the sirocco." 



BOOK II. — ODE XIV. 175 

whom Propertius (Lib. iii. Eleg. 10) reproached for leaving 
his wife Galba to join a military expedition, possibly that of 
^lius Gallus against the Arabians. This supposition would 
give a more pathetic significance to the " placens uxor " of 
the ode. 



Carm. XIV. 

Eheu fugaces, Postume, Postume, 
Labuntur anni, nee pietas moram 
Rugis et instanti senect^ 

AfFeret indomitseque Morti, — 

Non, si trecenis, quotquot eunt dies, 
Amice, places illacrimabilem 
Plutona tauris ; qui ter amplum 
Geryonen Tityonque tristi 

Compescit unda, scilicet omnibus, 
Quicunque terrae munere vescimur, 
Enaviganda, sive reges 
Sive inopes erimus coloni. 

Frustra cruento Marte carebimus, 
Fractisque rauci fluctibus Hadrias, 
Frustra per auctumnos nocentem 
Corporibus metuemus Austrum : 

Visendus ater flumine languido 
Cocytos errans, et Danai genus 
Infame, damnatusque longi 
Sisyphus bolides laboris. 



1/6 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Lands, home, and wife, in whom thy soul delighteth. 
Left; and one tree alone of all thy woodlands, 
Loathed cypress, faithful found, 

Shall follow to the last the brief-lived lord. 

The worthier heir thy Caecuban shall squander. 
Bursting the hundred locks that guard its treasure. 
And wines more rare than those 

Sipped at high feast by pontiffs, '"^ dye thy floors. 



* As the English say, "A dinner fit for an alderman," so the Romans 
said, *'A banquet fit for a pontiff." " Pontificum dapes, Saliares 
coenae." 



BOOK II. — ODE XIV. 177 

Linquenda tellus, et domus, et placens 
Uxor j neque harum, quas colis, arborum 
Te, pr^eter invisas cupressos, 
Ulla brevem dominum sequetur. 

Absumet heres Caecuba dignior 
Servata centum clavibus, et mero 
Tinget pavimentum superbo, 
Pontificum potiore coenis. 



M 



178 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XV. 

ON THE IMMODERATE LUXURY OF THE AGE. 

This ode is generally considered to be among those 
written to assist Augustus in his social reforms, and, as 
Macleane observes, it should be read in connection with 
the earlier odes of Book III. Dillenburger assigns the date 
to A.U.C. 726, in which year Octavius, then Censor, restored 
and adorned the public temples fallen into decay. Mac- 
leane 

Lo, those regal piles rising ! methinks, to the harrow 
They will leave but few acres; on every side round us 
Vasty stewponds for fishes extend 

Wider bounds than the Lake of Lucrinus. 

Yield the vine-wedded elms to that Calebs the plane-tree ; 
And, where olives sufficed for the wealth of the master, 
The violet and myrtle encamp. 

With the whole languid army of odours ; 

Every sunstroke shut out by thick screen-works of laurel. 
Ah ! not such the decrees left by Rome's hardy Founder, 
Nor the auspice of Cato unshorn, 

Nor the customs bequeathed by our fathers. 

Petty then was to each man the selfish possession, 
Mighty then was all to men the Commonwealth's treasure ; 
No one sought the cool shade of the North 
Under peristyles planned out for temples ;* 

The chance turf next at hand roofed the citizen's dwelling, 
But the State, at its charge, rarest marble devoted 
To the State's sacred heirlooms ; — the shrines 
Of the gods, and the courts of a people. 



BOOK II.— ODE XV. 179 ' 

1 

leane favours that date. But the poem alludes also to the i 

sumptuary laws passed by Augustus at various periods, as ] 
ineffectively as sumptuary laws always must be in rich 
communities. 

Carm. XV. j 

Jam pauca aratro jugera regiae | 

Moles relinquent : undique latius | 

Extenta visentur Lucrino < 

Stagna lacu : platanusque caelebs, I 

i 

Evincet ulmos : tum violaria et '. 
Myrtus et omnis copia narium, 

Spargent olivetis odorem j 

Fertilibus domino priori ; \ 

Tum spissa ramis laurea fervidos j 

Excludet ictus. Non ita Romuli l 

Prsescriptum et intonsi Catonis | 
Auspiciis, veterumque norma. 

Privatus illis census erat brevis, 
Commune magnum : nulla decempedis 

Metata privatis opacam . i 

Porticus excipiebat Arcton ;* ' 

Nee fortuitum spernere csespitem. 
Leges sinebant, oppida publico 

Sumptu jubentes et deorum ; 

Templa nova decorare saxo. ; 

* "Nulla decempedis ' 
Metata privatis opacam 

Porticus excipiebat Arcton." , 

No private man had porticoes measured by a ten-feet rule, which appears j 

to have been a measurement for temples and public buildings. The \ 

peristyles at Pompeii, which form an inner court to the house, give I 

sufficient idea of these corridors, opening to the north for coolness | 

in summer, and to the south for sunshine in winter. i 



l8o THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XVL 

TO POMPEIUS GROSPHUS. 

According to the scholiast in Cruquius, this Pompeius 
Grosphus, a Sicilian by origin, was of the Equestrian order. 
Cicero (in Cic. Verr. II. iii. 23) speaks of Eubulides Gros- 
phus Centuripinus, as a man of eminent worth, noble birth, 
and princely wealth. Estre conj ectures that this Grosphus was 

made 
For ease prays he who in the wide ^gsean 
Storm-seized, looks up on clouds that heap their darkness 
O'er the lost moon, while dim the constellations 
Fade from the sailor. 

Ease, still for ease, sighs Thracia fierce in battle. 
Still for ease sighs the quivered Mede. Ah, Grosphus ! 
Nor gems nor purple, no, nor gold can buy it ; 
Ease is not venal. 

Bribed by no king,* dispersed before no lictor, 
Throng the wild tumults of a soul in trouble, 
And the cares circling round a sleepless pillow, 
Under ceiled fretwork.t 

He lives on little well who, for all splendour, 
Decks his plain board with some prized silver heirloom.:}: 
From him no greed of gain, of loss no terror. 
Snatch the light slumbers. 

Why, briefly strong, with space in time thus bounded, 
Launch we so many arrows into distance ? 

* "Non enim gazoe." "Gazas," from a Persian word, means "the 
king's treasury," " the royal coffers." 

+ " Laqueata tecta," "non totius domus sed cubiculorum et tricli- 
niarum. " — Dillenburger. 

+ "Paternum salinum" — "the paternal or hereditary salt-cellar." 



BOOK 11. — ODE XVI. l8l 

made a Roman citizen by Pompey, and took his name, which 
descended to the Grosphus of the ode as son or grandson. 
In Epist. i. 12, Horace commends him to Iccius, then acting 
as superintendent or steward to Vipsanius Agrippa's estates 
in Sicily, as one whom Iccius might wilHngly obHge, for he 
would never ask anything not honest and just. 

Carm. XVI. 

Otium divos rogat in patenti 
Prensus ^gseo, simul atra nubes 
Condidit Lunam, neque certa fulgent 
Sidera nautis ; 

Otium bello furiosa Thrace, 
Otium Medi pharetra decori, 
Grosphe, non gemmis neque purpura ve- 
nale neque auro. 

Non enim gazae '^ neque consularis 
Summovet lictor miseros tumultus 
Mentis, et Curas laqueata circum 
Tectat volantes. 

Vivitur parvo bene, cui paternum 
Splendet in mensa tenui salinum : J 
Nee leves somnos timor aut cupido 
Sordidus aufert. 

Quid brevi fortes jaculamur gevo 
Multa ? Quid terras alio calentes 



Horace here, as elsewhere, distinguishes the comparative poverty of a 
small independence from absolute neediness and squalor. The poverty 
he praises is not without its own modest refinements. The hoard may 
be simple, but still it can display the old family salt-cellar, kept with 
religious care. If the owner has not increased the paternal fortune, he 
has not diminished it. 



1 82 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Why crave new suns ? What exile from his country 
Flies himself also ? 

Diseased Care'^ ascends the brazen galley, 
And rides amidst the armed men to the battle,t 
Fleeter than stag, and fleeter than, when driving 
Rain-clouds, the east wind. 

The mind, which now is glad, should hate to carry 
Its care beyond the Present ; what is bitter 
With easy smile should sweeten : nought was ever 
Happy on all sides. 

Untimely death snatched off renowned Achilles ; 
Tithonus lived to dwindle into shadow ; 
And haply what the Hour to thee refuses 
Me it will proffer, if 

Around thine home a hundred flocks are bleating, 
Low the Sicilian heifers, neighs the courser 
Trained to the race-car ; woofs in Afric purple 
Twice-tinged array thee : 

To me the Fate, that cannot err,§ hath given 
Some roods of land, some breathings, lowly murmured, 
Of Grecian Muse, and power to scorn the malice 
Of the mean vulgar. 

* "Vitiosa cura." In the translation, Orelli's interpretation of 
"vitiosa," "morbosa" — z.^., morbid or diseased, from the vice of the 
mind whence it springs — is adopted. But this hardly gives the full force 
of the vi^ord. Horace means that Care, which spoils or infects every- 
thing, ascends the galley, &c. 

+ "Turmas equitum." " This properly refers to the horsemen rid- 
ing to battle made anxious by the hope of booty or the fear of death." 
— Orelli. " With ' turmas equitum' is usually compared ' post equi- 
tem sedet atra cura,' but the sense there is a little different. Here he 
speaks of care following a man to the field of battle ; there he refers to 
the rich man ambling on his horse." — Macleane. 

X '* Et mihi forsan, tibi quod negarit, 
Porriget Hora." 
I think, with Orelli, that this simply means, *' Fortune, or the Hour, 



BOOK II.— ODE XVI. 



vi83 



Sole mutamus ? Patriae quis exsul 
Se quoque fugit ? 

Scandit aeratas vitiosa naves 
Cura,"^ nee turmas equitum relinquit,t 
Ocior cervis, et agente nimbos 
Ocior Euro. 

Laetus in praesens animus quod ultra est 
Oderit curare, et amara lento 
Temperet risu ; nihil est ab omni 
Parte beatum. 

Abstulit clarum cita mors Achillem, 
Longa Tithonum minuit senectus, 
Et mihi forsan, tibi quod negarit, 
Porriget Hora.J 

Te greges centum Siculaeque circum 
Mugiunt vaccae, tibi tollit hinnitum 
Apta quadrigis equa, te bis Afro 
Murice tinctae 

Vestiunt lanae : mihi parva rura, et 
Spiritum Graiae tenuem Camenae 
Parca non mendax § dedit, et malignum 
Spernere volgus. 

will perhaps give something of good to me which she denies to you ;" 
and I dissent altogether from the usual interpretation — viz., "Time 
may perhaps give me a longer life than it concedes to you." That in- 
terpretation would be very little in keeping with Horace's general polite- 
ness in addressing a friend. Nothing can well be worse-bred than tell- 
ing a man that perhaps you will live longer than he will. Besides, 
Horace immediately proceeds to define that which is granted peculiarly 
to himself in opposition to the riches bestowed upon Grosphus. 

§ " Parca non mendax" — " sure," "unfailing in the fulfilment of their 
decrees." Compare "veraces," C. wSsecul. 25, and Persius, v. 42, 
" Parca tenax veri." — So Orelli. " Genius is represented as the gift 
of Fate in Pind. Od. ix. 26, 28 ; also in Nem. iv. 41-43, where the poet 
infers from it his own eventual triumph over detraction ; as Horace may 
be said to do here." — Yonge. 




184 / / THE ODES OF HORACE. 

E XVII. 

-^O MAECENAS. 

This ode is addressed te)<\l8ecenas in illness, ]A\. the date 
of the illness is necessarily uncertain in the life of a vale- 
tudinarian like Maecenas. Though, as Macleane observes, 
the last two lines of this ode, showing that Horace had 
not yet paid the sacrifice he had vowed to Faunus for his 
preservation from death, makes it most probable that it was 
written not long after C. 13 of this book, the composition of 
which has been assigned, with some hesitation, to a.u.c. 728. 
Maecenas was subject to what appears to have been a low 
nervous fever, attended with loss of sleep. According to the 
verses attributed to him, and censured with a stoic's lofty 
disdain by Seneca (Epp. loi), Maecenas had a passionate 
and clinging desire for life, very uncommon in a Roman, 
deeming that, under any suffering or infirmity, life was still 
dear — 

" Vita 

Why destroyest thou me with the groan of thy sufferings ? 
Neither I nor the gods will let thee die before me, 
O Maecenas, the glory and grace 
And the column itself, of my life. 

Ah ! if some fatal force, prematurely bereaving. 
Wrenched from me the one half of my soul, could the other 
Linger on, with its dearer part lost. 

And the fragment of what was a whole ? 

No ! in thy life is mine ; both, the same day shall shatter. 
I have made no false vow ; where thou lead'st me I follow ; 
Fellow-travellers, the same solemn road 
We will take, we will take, side by side. 



BOOK II. — ODE XVII. ^ 185 

*' Vita dum superest bene est : 

Hanc mihi vel acuta 

Si sedeam cruce sustine." * 

If this sentiment was sincerely expressed, the pathos of the 
poem is increased. A man so dreading death may well 
desire a companion in the last journey. And it is not un- 
likely that the melancholy view which Horace habitually 
takes of the next world, and his exhortations to make the 
best of this one, may have been coloured, perhaps insensi- 
bly to himself, by his conversations and intercourse with 
Maecenas. 

Carm. XVII. 

Cur me querelis exanimas tuis ? 
Nee dis amicum est nee mihi te prius 
Obire, Maecenas, mearum 

Grande decus columenque rerum. 

Ah ! te meae si partem animae rapit 
Maturior vis, quid moror altera, 
Nee carus aeque nee superstes 
Integer? Ille dies utramque 

Ducet ruinam. Non ego perfidum 
Dixi sacramentum : ibimus, ibimus, 
Utcunque praecedes, supremum 
Carpere iter comites parati. 

* The fragment is thus very happily rendered into English by Mr 
Farrar in the biographical essay on Seneca, which forms the larger por- 
tion of his impressive and eloquent work, 'The Seekers after God': — 

'* Numb my hands with palsy, 

Rack my feet with gout, 
Hunch my back and shoulder, 

Let my teeth fall out ; 
Still, if life be granted, 

I prefer the loss — 
Save my life and give me 

Anguish on the cross." 



1 86 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Me, no flames bursting forth from the jaws of Chimaera, 
Me, no Gyas once more rising up hundred-handed, 
Could dispart from thyself, — such the will 
Of omnipotent Justice and Fate. 

Whether Libra, or Scorpio with aspect* malignant, 
In mine horoscope, ruled o'er the Houses of Danger, 
Or moist Capricorn, lord of the west ; 
It is strange how our stars have agreed. 

Thee, thine own native Jupiter snatched from fell Saturn, 
And outshining his beam, stayed the wings of the Parcae, 
When the theatre hailed thee restored. 
And the multitude thrice shouted joy. 

Me the fall of the tree would have brained, had not Faunus, 
To men born under Mercury, guardian benignant. 
O'er my head stretched the saving right hand. 
And made lighter the death-dealing blow. 

Then forget not to render to Jove, the Preserver 
Of a life so august, votive chapel and victims, 
While I, to mine own sylvan god. 

Offer grateful mine own humble lamb. 



* "Adspicit," "aspected," is still the technical term in use among 
astrologers, according to whom the native star may be evilly aspected 
in various ways. But "pars violentior" would apply to the hostile 
influences affecting "the Lord of life," chiefly found in the significa- 
tions of the 8th and 12th House. By his allusion to Capricorn, Horace 
clearly refers to his dangers by sea — "Sicula unda." To astrology (a 
science then so much in fashion) Horace often refers — sometimes with 
scorn, sometimes with a seeming credulity — always as a man who 
knew very little about it. But where he speaks of it with scorn, as in 
addressing Leuconoe, Book I. Ode xi., it is less to denounce astro- 
logy itself as an imposture, than to dissuade from all attempts to 
divine the future — "better that the future should remain unknown 



BOOK 11. — ODE XVII. 1 8; 

Me nee Chimaeras spiritus igneae, 
Nee, si resurgat, centimanus Gyas 
Divellet unquam : sic potenti 
Justitiae placitumque Parcis. 

Seu Libra, seu me Scorpios adspicit '^ 
Formidolosus, pars violentior 
Natalis horae, seu tyrannus 
Hesperiae Capricornis undae, 

Utrumque nostrum incredibili modo 
Consentit astrum. Te Jovis impio 
Tutela Satumo refulgens 
Eripuit, volucrisque Fati 

Tardavit alas, cum populus frequens 
Laetum theatris ter crepuit sonum : 
Me truncus illapsus cerebro 
Sustulerat, nisi Faunus ictum 

Dextra levasset, Mercurialium 
Gustos virorum. Reddere victimas 
^demque votivam memento : 
Nos humilem feriemus agnam. 



and unconjectured." On the other hand, where, as in this ode, he 
seems to affect credulity, it is only for a playful purpose. He regarded 
it, as he did most of the popular beliefs affecting the future, without 
serious examination of its truth or falsehood, as a question of specu- 
lative philosophy, but to be freely used, whether in sport or in earnest, 
for the purposes of poetic art. 



1 88 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XVIII. 

AGAINST THE GRASPING AMBITION OF THE COVETOUS. 

This ode is in a metre of which there is no other example 
in Horace. It is said to have been invented by Hipponax 
of Ephesus, and is called generally by his name ; though 
sometimes Euripidean, because often used by Euripides. 

It 
To me nor gold nor ivory lends 

Its shine to fret my ceiling ; 
Nor shafts, in farthest Afric hewn, 
Prop architraves Hymettian.* 

I do not claim, an unknown heir. 
The spoils of Orient kingdoms,t 

No wives J of honest clients weave 
For me Laconian purples. 

Yet mine is truth and mine some vein 

Of inborn genius kindly ; 
Though poor, I do not court the rich, 

But by the rich am courted. 

I do not weary heaven for more ; 

I tax no kindly patron ; 
Content with all I own on earth. 

Some rural acres Sabine. 



* The Numidian or Libyan marble, known to us as the Giallo antico. 
The ** architraves Hymettian" (" trabes Hymettias") are the wh;te 
marble of Hymettus. 

t "Neque Attali 
Ignotus hei-es regiam occupavi." 
Attains the third made by will the Romans his heirs ; the older com- 
mentators suppose that the lines satirically imply the will to have been 
fraudulently obtained. But the word '* ignotus " does not necessarily bear 
that signification. As Orelli observes, the irony consists in the fact that 



BOOK II. — ODE XVIII. 189 

It abounds in trochees. I can only attempt to give a 
general idea of its trippingness and brevity of sound. It 
treats, with more than usual beauty, Horace's favourite thesis 
of declamation against the grasping nature of avarice ; and, 
as Dillenburger observes, it takes up and expands the senti- 
ment with which he had closed Ode xvi. , 



Carm. XVIII. 

Non ebur neque aureum 

Mea renidet in domo lacunar ; 

Non trabes Hymettiae* 

Premunt columnas ultima recisas 

Africa ; neque Attalit 

Ignotus heres regiam occupavi ; 
Nee Laconicas mihi 

Trahunt honestae purpuras clientae.J 

At fides et ingeni 

Benigna vena est, pauperemque dives 
Me petit ; nihil supra 

Deos lacesso, nee potentem amicum 

Largiora flagito, 

Satis beatus unicis Sabinis. 
Truditur dies die, 

Novaeque pergunt interire Lunse : 



Attalus did not know the persons he enriched. Torrentius supposes 
the lines to refer to Aristonicus, who, after the death of Attalus, seized 
on the throne by false pretences, defeated Licinius Crassus, was after- 
wards conquered by Perpenna, carried to Rome, and strangled in prison 
by orders of the Senate. The former interpretation is preferable. 

+ " 'Honestae clientse.' I have seen no satisfactory explanation of 
the words * honestae clientae.' Mr Long has suggested to me that they 
may refer to the rustic women on a man's farms — the wives of the 
Coloni. " — Maclean E. 



190 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Day treads upon the heels of day, 
New moons wane on to perish ; 

Thou on the brink of death dost make 
Vain contracts for new marble ; 

Building proud homes, and of thy last — 
The sepulchre — forgetful ; 

As if the earth itself too small 

Thou robb'st new earth from ocean, 

And, urging on a length of shore 
Upon the deep's foundation. 

Thou thrustest back the angry wave 
That wars in vain on Baiae.* 

What, must thou also, greeding still. 
Remove thy neighbour's landmark — 

Must ruthless avarice overleap 
Each fence of humble clients ? 

And man and wailing wife, expelled 
The dear paternal dwelling, 

Clasp ragged babes and exiled gods 
To wandering homeless bosoms ? 

And yet no surer hall awaits 
The wealthy tyrant master. 

Than that which yields yet ampler room 
In yet more greedy Orcus. 

Where farther tend ? Impartial earth 
Opes both for prince and peasant ; 

No gold bribed Charon to row back 
The crafty-souled Prometheus. 

Death holds the haughty Tantalus ; 

Death holds his children haughty: 
Invoked or not. Death hears the poor, 

And He gives rest to labour. 




BOOK II.— ODE XVIII. 191 

Tu secanda marmora 

Locas sub ipsum funus ; et sepulcri 
Immemor struis domos, 

Marisque Bails obstrepentis urges 

Summovere litora, 

Parum locuples continente ripa.''^ 
Quid, quod usque proximos 

Revellis agri terminos, et ultra 

Limites clientium 

Salis avarus ? Pellitur paternos 
In sinu ferens deos 

Et uxor, et vir, sordidosque natos. 

Nulla certior tamen 

Rapacis Orci fine destinata 
Aula divitem manet 

Herum. Quid ultra tendis ? ^qua tellus 

Pauperi recluditur 

Regumque pueris, nee satelles Orci 
Callidum Promethea 

Revexit auro captus. Hie superbum 

Tantalum atque Tantali 

Genus coercet, hie levare fun,ctum 
Pauperem laboribus 

Vocatus atque non vocatus audit. 



* In allusion to the practice of the wealthy Romans in building villas 
out into the sea, on artificial foundations — as, long afterwards, rose the 
whole city of Venice. 



192 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIX. 

IN HONOUR OF BACCHUS. 

Macleane appears to me greatly to underrate the beauty of 
this poem, in which he says the Greek fire is wanting. This 
is not the opinion of the earHer critics, nor of readers in 
general. It has as much of the character of the dithyramb 
as the taste of a Roman audience would sanction and the 
character of the Latin language allow. The date of the 

poem 

Amid sequestered rocky glens, — ye future times beUeve 

it!— 
Bacchus I saw, in mystic verse his pupil nymphs instruct- 
ing— 

Instructing pricked ears intent 
Of circling goat-hoofed Satyrs. 

CEvoe, with the recent awe is trembling yet my spirit, 
Filled with the god, my breast still heaves beneath the 
stormy rapture. 

CEvoe ! spare me ; Liber, spare, 
Dread with the solemn thyrsus ! 

Vouchsafed to me the glorious right to chant the head- 
strong Thyads, 
The wine that from the fountain welled, the rills with milk 
o'erflowing, 

And, from the trunks of charmed trees. 
The lapse of golden honey. 

Vouchsafed to sing thy consort's crown which adds a star to 

heaven,* 
Or that just wrath which overwhelmed the house of Theban 

Pentheus, 

* Ariadne. 



BOOK 11. — ODE XIX. 193 

poem is uncertain. Macleane suggests that it was perhaps 
composed at the time of the LiberaHa, though in what year 
there are no means of determining. From its dithyrambic 
character, Orelli conjectures it to have been a copy from 
some Greek poem. The metre in this and the translation 
immediately follomng has some slight deviations from the 
preceding versions of the Alcaic, but not such as to affect 
the general character and form of the rhythm. 



Carm. XIX. 

Bacchum in remotis carmina rupibus 
Vidi docentem, (credite posteri ! ) 
Nymphasque discentes, et aures 
Capripedum Satyrorum acutas. 

Euoe, recenti mens trepidat metu, 
Plenoque Bacchi pectore turbidum 
Laetatur. Euoe, parce, Liber, 
Parce, gravi metuende thyrso ! 

Fas pervicaces est mihi Thyiadas, 
Vinique fontem, lactis et uberes 
Cantare rivos, atque truncis 
Lapsa cavis iterare mella ; 

Fas et beatae conjugis additum 
Stellis honorem, tectaque Penthei 



N 



194 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

And doomed to so disastrous end 

The frantic king Lycurgus.* * 

Thou bow'st the rivers to thy will, barbarian ocean rulest j t I 
Bedewed with wine in secret hills, thy charm compels the ; 
serpents 

To interweave, in guileless coil. 

The locks of Thracian Maenads. ; 

j 
Thou, when aloft through arduous heaven the impious host ; 

of giants 
Scaled to the Father's realm, didst hurl again to earth huge i 
Rhoetus — j 

Fronting his might with lion-fangs. 

And jaws of yawning horror ; j 

Albeit thou wert deemed a god more fit for choral dances, 
For jest and sport the readiest Power, of slenderer use in 
battle ; ^ 

Yet peace and war found thee the same, ] 

Of both the soul and centre. j 

When flashed the golden horn that decks thy front through 

Stygian shadows, 
Harmless the Hell-dog wagged his tail to greet thy glorious 
coming. 

And gently licked with triple tongue 
Thine hallowed feet receding.:}: 



* Lycurgus, the King of the Edones, persecuted Bacchus on his 
passage through Thrace, and imprisoned his train of Satyrs. The 
mythologists vary as to the details of his punishment for this offence, 
but he was first inflicted with madness, and finally torn to pieces by 
horses. 

+ *'Tu flectis amnes, tu mare barbarum." "Flectis amnes" does 
not mean, as it is usually translated, "thou turnest aside the course 



BOOK II. — ODE XIX. 195 

Disjecta non leni mina, 



Thracis et exitium Lycurgi. 



Tu flectis amnes, tu mare barbarum,t 
Tu separatis uvidus in jugis 
Nodo coerces viperino 

Bistonidum sine fraude crines. 



Tu, cum parentis regna per arduum 
Cohors Gigantum scanderet impia, 
Rhoetum retorsisti leonis 
Unguibus horribilique mala ; 

Quamquam, choreis aptior et jocis 
Ludoque dictus, non sat idoneus 
Pugnae ferebaris : sed idem 
Pacis eras mediusque belli. 

Te vidit insons Cerberus aureo 
Cornu decorum, leniter atterens 
Caudam, et recedentis trilingui 
Ore pedes tetigitque crura. + 



of the rivers;" the reference is to the Hydaspes and Orontes, over 
which Bacchus is said to have w^alked dryshod ; and "flecto" here 
must be taken either in the sense of "to bow" or "direct," or, in 
its more metaphorical sense, "to appease." By "mare barbarum" 
is meant the Indian Ocean. 

+ OrelH observes that in this stanza there are two images, — one at 
the entrance of Liber into Hades, when Cerberus gently wags his tail to 
greet him — the other when Liber is leaving and the Hell-dog licks his 
feet. The poet thus expresses the security with which the god passes 
through the terrors of the nether world. 



196 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XX. 

ON HIS FUTURE FAME. y 

Horace has no ode more remarkable than this for liveli- 
ness of fancy and fervour of animal spirits. It is composed 
half in sport, half in earnest, though I cannot agree with 
Macleane that it has in its style anything of "the mock 
heroic," properly so called, still less that it was written im- 
promptu. Its rapid vivacity is no proof of want of artistic 
care. Dillenburger (in his Qu. Hor.) conjectures the ode 
to have been written in youth, and on the occasion of 
Maecenas's first invitation (recorded Sat. I. vi), so interpret- 
ing " quem vocas, dilecte Maecenas." But, as Macleane 
observes, "the epithet 'dilecte,' implying a familiarity of 

some 

I shall soar through the liquid air buoyed on a pinion 
Not familiar, not slight ; I will tarry no longer 

On this earth ; but victorious o'er envy, two-formed. 
Bard and bird, I abandon the cities of men. 

Born of parents obscure though I be, O Maecenas, 
I who still from thy mouth hear the title " Beloved," * 
I shall pass not away through the portals of death, 
I shall not be hemmed round by the waters of Styx. 

Now, now on my nether limbs rougher skin settles ; 
Now above to the form of white bird I am changing ; t 
Swiftly now from the hands and the shoulders behold 
Smooth and smoother the down of the plumes 
springing forth ! 

* "Quem vocas dilecte." I agree with Mr Conington in accept- 
ing Ritter's interpretation that "dilecte" is Maecenas's address to 
Horace. Upon this disputed point a very ilhistrious scholar, to whom, 
indeed, I am indebted for line 6 in the translation, writes to me thus : — 
" I rather doubt the naked use of * vocas ' in the sense of * invite to your 



BOOK IL— ODE XX. 1 97 

some standing, is opposed to this view ;" to which I may add 
the remark, that it is scarcely probable that Horace would 
have spoken with such confidence of his future fame till his 
claims as a lyrical poet were acknowledged by competent 
judges, to whom most of the odes in the first two, or per- 
haps the first three, books, if not yet collected into one pub- 
lication, were familiarly known. It was probably enough 
written in some moment of joyous excitement occasioned 
by a success more signal than any private invitation from 
Maecenas could confer ; but we know too little of the various 
stepping-stones in Horace's poetical career to form any rea- 
sonable conjecture as to its date and occasion. It is enough 
that the poem itself so wonderfully vindicates the pretension 
of the poet to be also the prophet. 

Carm. XX. 

Non usitata nee tenui ferar 
Penna biformis per liquidum sethera 
Vates ; neque in terris morabor 
Longius j invidiaque major 

Urbes relinquam. Non ego, pauperum 
Sanguis parentum, non ego, quem vocas 
Dilecte,"^ Maecenas, obibo, 
Nee Stygia cohibebor unda. 

Jam jam residunt cruribus asperae 
Pelles ; et album mutor in alitem 
Superne ;t nascunturque leves 
Per digitos humerosque plumae. 

society' ('revocas' is used Sat. I. vi. 6i,but then of a particular repeated 
invitation, not of a general one) ; I therefore incline to prefer the inter- 
pretation 'Quem Maecenas, vocas "dilecte," ' though I admit the bold- 
ness of this construction." 

+ " Album mutor in alitem superne." The white bird is, of course, 
the swan — "Multa Dircasum levat aura cycnum." — Lib. IV. Od. ii. 25. 



198 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Than the swift son of Dasdalus swifter I travel. 
I shall visit shores loud with the boom of the Euxine, 
And fields Hyperborean and African sands, 
And wherever I wander shall sing as a bird. 

Me the Colchians shall know, me the Dacian* dissembling 
His dismay at the might of his victor the Roman ; 
Me Scythia's far son ; — learned students in me 

Shall be Spain's rugged child and the drinker of 
Rhone, t 

Not for me raise the death-dirge, mine urn shall be empty;:}: 
Hush the vain ceremonial of groans that degrade me. 
And waste not the honours ye pay to the dead 
On a tomb in whose silence I shall not repose. 



* " Et qui dissimulat metum 
Marsse cohortis Dacus." 
The Marsian infantry was the flower of the Roman armies, and the Mar- 
sian here represents the might of Rome. Either the interruption to the 
rapidity of the verse by the allusion to the Dacian's haughty dissimula- 
tion of the terror with which he regards the Roman arms must be con- 
sidered, as it has been considered by critics, one of those "impertinences," 
for the sake of a popular hit, which is noticed in the preliminary essay as 
a defect in Horace ; or it may possibly escape that reproach, and, per- 
tinently to the purpose of the poem, mean that whatever the disguised 
terror in which the Dacian holds the Roman soldier, he will welcome 
the Roman poet. 

+ "Me peritus 
Discet Hiber, Rhodanique potor." 
"Peritus Hiber" does not mean "the learned Spaniard," as it is com- 
monly translated. The adjective applies, as in similar cases is habitual 
with Horace, both to " Hiber " and " Rhodani potor ;" and as Dillen- 
burger, Orelli, and Macleane agree, the meaning is, "that these barbaric 
nations will becojue \QrsQ.d in me." Macleane thinks that by "Hiber" 
is probably meant the Caucasian people of that name ; I follow, how- 
ever, the interpretation popularly accepted — and sanctioned by Orelli 
—that "Hiber " means "the Spaniard." The "Drinker of Rhone " is 
the Gaul. 



BOOK IL— ODE XX. 1 99 

Jam Dsedaleo ocior Icaro 
Visam gementis litora Bospori, 
Syrtesque Gaetulas canorus 
Ales Hyperboreosque campos. 

Me Colchus, et qui dissimulat metum 
Marsae cohortis Dacus,* et ultimi 
Noscent Geloni ; me peritus 

Discet Hiber, Rhodanique potor.t 

Absint inani funere neniae, J 
Luctusque turpes et querimoni^ ; 
Compesce clamorem, ac sepulcri 
Mitte supervacuos honores. 



+ "Absint inani funere neniae." "Inani funere," because the body- 
is not there. — Orelli. 



200 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

BOOK III.— ODE I. 

ON THE WISDOM OF CONTENT. 

This ode opens with a stanza which modern critics gene- 
rally consider to be an introduction not only to the ode 
itself, but also to the five following — all six constituting, as 
it were, serial parts of one varied poem, written about the 
same time and for the same object — viz., to aid in the refor- 
mation of manners which Augustus undertook at the close 
of the civil wars. The date of these and other odes con- 
ceived in the same spirit (as Lib. II. Od. xv. and xviii.) 
would therefore be referable to the period from a.u.c. 725 
to A.u.c. 728. The first line of the introductory stanza to 
this ode imitates the formal exhortation of the priest at the 
Mysteries, warning away the profane. The conclusion of 
the stanza, " Virginibus puerisque canto," if, as recent inter- 
preters 
I hate the uninitiate crowd — I drive it hence away; 
Silence, while I, the Muses' priest, chant hymns unheard 

before ; 
I chant to virgins and to youths, 

I chaunt to listeners pure. 

Dread kings control their subject flocks; o'er kings them- 
selves reigns Jove, 

Glorious for triumph won in war when giants stormed his 
heaven, 
' And moving with almighty brow * 
The universe of things. 

* " Cuncta supercilio moventis." With his usual felicity of wording, 
Horace avoids the commonplace expression of "the Olympian nod," 
though the line implies that and something more ; it implies the Deity's 
intellectual government of all things, and explains the connection with 
the stanzas that immediately follow, — the nod of Jove confirms the law 
of Fate to which all men are subjected. 



BOOK III. — ODE I. 201 

preters assume, addressed to the chorus of boys and girls 
surrounding the priests and singing the praises of the gods, 
has also, according to the scholiasts, a much wider signi- 
ficance, and is a special address to the rising generation. 
"Horace," says Macleane, "speaks as if he despaired of 
impressing his precepts on any but the young, and bids the 
rest stand aside, as incapable of being initiated in the true 
wisdom of life." It is not easy to assign an appropriate 
heading to this ode. That which I select appears, on the 
whole, better than any other in use, though not quite satis- 
factory. The whole ode, which ranks high among the 
noblest attempts of a poet to embody didactic purpose in 
lyrical form, consists in a succession of brilHant images or 
pictures, seemingly detached, but constituting a moral 
whole. I St, The solemn recognition of the supreme God 
triumphant over brute force (" Clari Giganteo triumpho"), 
and governing the universe; 2dly, The impartiality of Fate, 
and the certainty of death ; sdly. The misery of the guilty 
conscience not to be soothed by sensual or artistic enjoy- 
ments. At line 25, " Desiderantem quod satis est," the 
main object of the poem — viz., in the inculcation of that 
msdom of contentment by which Horace contrives to unite 
Epicurean with Stoic philosophy — develops itself, and is 
continued to the close. 

Carm. I. 

i Odi profanum vulgus et arceo ; 

Favete Unguis : carmina non prius 
Audita Musarum sacerdos 
Virginibus puerisque canto. 

Regum timendonim in proprios greges, 
Reges in ipsos imperium est Jovis, 
Clari Giganteo triumpho, 
Cuncta supercilio moventis.* 



202 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Man vies with man — 'tis so ordained ; this, wider sets his 

vines,* 
That, nobler-born, the Campus t seeks, competitor for power 
With one who boasts of purer hfe. 

And one of clients more : 

Necessity with equal law assorts the varying lots ; 

Though this may bear the lofty name and that may bear the 

low, 
Each in her ample urn she shakes. 

And casts the die for all.J 

To him above whose guilty neck hangs down the naked 

sword, 
Sicilian arts elaborate not the sweets that flavour food. 
Nor song of bird nor chord of lute 

Charms back the truant sleep. § 

Yet sleep is meek, nor scorns the cots that shelter rural toil, 
Nor banks that find their pall of state in shadowy summer 

boughs. 
Nor vales in Tempe never vexed 

Save by the Zephyr's wing. 



* ' ' Est ut viro vir latius ordinet 
Arbusta sulcis." 
" Est ut," "it is the case, it is ordained that men shovild vary in wealth 
and condition." — Yonge. " Latius ordinet arbusta sulcis" — viz., one 
man may compete vi^ith another man in extent of possessions : literally, 
that he may marshal trees — chiefly, but not exclusively, vines — in par- 
allel lines, or in the shape of the quincunx, to a greater extent than 
another. 

+ " Descendat in Campum." It v^^as on the Campus Martins that the 
Comitia Centuriata, at which the election of magistrates took place, were 
held. The Campus was on low gi-ound ; but Yonge observes that 
"descendat" is the exact word to express a contest, to descend into the 
arena. 



BOOK III. — ODE I. 203 

Est ut* viro vir latius ordinet 
Arbusta sulcis, hie generosior 
Descendat in Campumt petitor, 
Moribus hie meliorque fama 

Contendat, illi turba clientium 
Sit major : aequa lege Neeessitas 
Sortitur insignes et imos ; 

Omne eapax movet uma nomen.J 

Destrietus ensis cui super impia 
Cerviee pendet, non Sieulae dapes 
Dulcem elaborabunt saporem, 
Non avium citharaeque eantus § 

Somnum redueent. Somnus agrestium 
Lenis virorum non humiles domos 
Fastidit, umbrosamque ripam, 
Non Zephyris agitata Tempe. 



t "Omne capax movet uma nomen." .The image is taken from the 
use of the dice, so familiar to the Romans. Fate is represented as hold- 
ing the urn which contains the lots of all men. This she keeps shaking 
(as we shake or rattle the dice-box), and casts out the lots indifferently. 

§ "Non avium citharaeque eantus." It must not be supposed that 
the natural song of the wild bird out of doors is here meant. Horace is 
speaking of artificial luxuries in contradistinction to the banks and vales 
of the following stanza, to which the song of the wild bird would apply. 
Here he means the singing-birds which the Romans kept in aviaries 
within their houses. Their notes, and the sound of distant music, and 
the trickling of water, were among the artificial means for soothing the 
nerves and inducing sleep, practised by the luxurious. Maecenas, who 
suffered from insomnia during that kind of nervous depression which 
saddened his later years, is said by Seneca to have endeavoured to lull 
himself to sleep by the aid of distant music. It is not to Maecenas, how- 
ever, that Horace here alludes, for such an allusion in this place would 
have been an unfeeling affront. 



204 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

To him who curbs desire within the bounds of ^The \ 
Enough,' ! 

The wildest blasts that heave the sea awake no fear of wreck ; i 
He quails not though Arcturus set, 
Or Haedus rise, in storm ; 

Though reel the vines beneath the hail, though crops belie j 

the hope, i 

Though trees despoiled of fruit accuse now spring's corrod- 
ing showers, 

Now summer's scorch and fiery stars, ] 

Now winter's crowning wrongs. ' 

Lo, where the mighty moles extend new lands into the deep. 
The scaled races feel their sea shrink round the invading ; 

piles ; 
As many a builder's burly gang 

Heaves the huge rubble down,* I 

Obedient to a lord who scorns so small a bound as earth ; \ 

Yet Conscience, whispering fears and threats, ascends with 

him the tower, i 

Black Care sits by him in the bark, j 

Behind him, on the steed, t i 

Since Phrygian marble:|: nought avails to soothe a mind 

diseased. 
And nought the pomp of purple robes albeit outshining stars, . 
And nought the Achsemenian balm, I 

Nought the Falernian vine ; i 



* "Hue frequens 
Caementa demittit redemptor 
Cum famulis.' 
"* Coementa," the rough mixture of large and small stones, mortar, &c. 
(rubble), which served for foundations. "Redemptor," literally the 
" contractor" or "architect." 



BOOK III. — ODE I. 205 

Desiderantem quod satis est neque 
Tumultuosum sollicitat mare, 
Nee saevus Arcturi cadentis 
Impetus, aut orientis Hsedi ; 

Non verberatae grandine vineae, 
Fundusque mendax, arbore nunc aquas 
Culpante, nunc torrentia agros 
Sidera, nunc hiemes iniquas. 

Contracta pisces aequora sentiunt 
Jactis in altum molibus ; hue frequens 
Caementa demittit redemptor 

Cum famulis,* dominusque terrae 

Fastidiosus. Sed Timor et Minae 
Scandunt eodem, quo dominus ; neque 
Decedit aerata triremi, et 

Post equitem sedet atra Cura.t 

Quodsi dolentem nee Phrygius lapis J 
Nee purpurarum sidere clarior 
Delenit usus, nee Falema 

Vitis, Achaemeniumque costum ; 



t *' Sed Timor et Minae 
Scandunt eodem, quo dominus ; neque 
Decedit aerata triremi, et 

Post equitem sedet atra Cura." 
"Minae intemae propter facinora commissa." — Orelli. "Threats of 
conscience." " Scandunt," ascend the lofty tower or belvidere, which 
was then the fashionable appendage to the villas of the wealthy. ' ' The 
* aerata triremis' was the rich man's private yacht." — Macleane. The 
distinction between "Post equitem sedet atra Cura," and "Cura nee 
turmas equitum relinquit," Lib, 11. Od. xvi. 22, has been noticed in the 
note to the line last mentioned. 

t " Phrygius lapis," a costly marble from Synnada in Phrygia, white, 
with red spots, in great esteem for columns, &c. 



206 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Why should I rear some hall sublime to Rome's last taste 

refined, 
With pillared doors "^ which never ope but envy enters in ? 
Oh, why for riches, wearier far, 
Exchange my Sabine vale ? 



* "Postibus 'invidendis." "Postes" were the jambs, columns, or 
pilasters that flanked the entrance door, and the word is often used for 
the door itself I do not know of any authority for interpreting 
"postes" as the rows of pillars within the "atrium" itself, which some 
commentators are inclined to do. 



BOOK III.— ODE I. 207 



Cur invidendis postibus * et novo 
Sublime ritu moliar atrium ? 
Cur valle permutem Sabina 
Divitias operosiores ? 



208 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE II. 
THE DISCIPLINE OF YOUTH. 

As in the preceding ode the virtue of contentment is en- 
forced, so this commences with enjoining that early training 
in simple and hardy habits which engenders the spirit of 
content, because it forms the mind betimes to disdain 

luxury. 

To bear privation'^ as a friend — to love its wholesome stint, 
Train the youth nerved by hardy sports which form the 
school of war, 
A rider dread, with practised spear, 
To harry Parthian foes. 

Inured to danger and to days beneath unsheltered skies. 
On him from high embattled walls of kings at war with Rome, 
Matron and ripening maid shall gaze, 
And inly sigh, " Alas ! 

" O never may our princely lord in arms unskilled, provoke 
Yon lion whom 'twere death to touch ; by the fell rage for 
blood. 
Where most the slaughters thicken round. 
Hurried, in rapture, on ! " 

Glorious and sweet it is to die for the dear native land ; t 
Even him who runs away from Death, Death follows fast 
behind — 
Death does not spare the recreant back, 
And hamstrings limbs that flee. 



* '* Pauperiem." It is difficult here, as elsewhere, to find an English 
word that correctly renders the sense of "pauperies." In this passage 
I can think of no better word than "privation," interpreted as tlie 



BOOK III.— ODE II. 209 

luxury. Discipline of this kind is the foundation of courage, 
love of country', the independence of character which loves 
virtue for its own sake, and the self-restraint which is essen- 
tial to social good faith and honour. 

Carm. II. 

Angustam amice pauperiem* pati 
Robustus acri militia puer 
Condiscat, et Parthos feroces 
Vexet eques metuendus hasta, 

Vitamque sub divo et trepidis agat 
In rebus. Ilium ex moenibus hosticis 
Matrona bellantis tyranni 
Prospiciens et adulta virgo 

Suspiret, Eheu, ne rudis agminum 
Sponsus lacessat regius asperum 
Tactu leonem, quem cruenta 
Per medias rapit ira csedes. 

Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori : + 
Mors et fugacem persequitur virum, 
Nee parcit imbellis juventae 
Poplitibus timidoque tergo. 



privation of luxuries. Poverty would be here wholly inapplicable, this 
ode being addressed, with the one that precedes and the three that fol- 
low it, to youths quite as much of the richer classes as of the poorer. 
"Robustus acri militia puer:" I take "robustus" with "militia" — 
the boy made robust by martial exercise and discipline. Among the 
Romans, the age for military exercise began at seventeen. 

+ "Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori." "In Horace's mind 
there was a close connection between the virtue of frugal contentment 
and devotion to one's country." — Macleane. 

O 



210 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Virtue ne'er knows of a defeat which brings with it disgrace; J 
The blazon of her honours ne'er the breath of men can stain ; 
Her fasces she nor takes nor quits 
As veers the popular gale. 

Virtue essays her flight through ways to all but her denied ; 
To those who do not merit death she opes the gates of 
heaven, 
And, spurning vulgar mobs and mire, 
Soars with escaping wing. 

There is a silence unto which a safe reward is due. 
With him whose tongue the sacred rites of Ceres blabs abroad, 
May I ne'er sit beneath a roof, 
Nor launch a shallop frail ! 

For Jove neglected oft confounds the good man with the 

bad ; 
And though avenging Punishment is lame indeed of foot. 
Yet rarely lags she long behind 
The swiftest flight of Crime. 



+ ** Virtus, repulsse nescia sordidje, 
Intaminatis fulget honoribus," 
The meaning of these lines has been much disputed, but seems to me 
sufficiently clear. The point is in the epithets, "sordidae," " intamina- 
tis." It cannot be truly said that Virtue is ignorant or unconscious of a 
defeat or rejection ("repulsae" applies to the defeat at a popular elec-- 
tion {a), but it is said truly that Virtue knows not any such defeat as can 
disgrace her (sordidae). The honours that Virtue seeks are distinguished 
from civil honours, insomuch as the latter, being conceded by the people 
or the state, are by the people or the state to be reversed or sullied ; but 



(a) Thus, in the Epistles, I. i. 42, Horace says, — ^ 

" Vides, quae maxima credis ^ 

Esse mala, exiguum censum turpemque repulsam ; " ] 

which Macleane, referring to "repulsae — sordidae" of this ode, interprets quaintly, | 

" He who would secure an election must have a command of money." 



BOOK III. — ODE II. 211 

Virtus, repulsae nescia sordidae, if 
Intaminatis fulget honoribus ; 
Nee sumit aiit ponit secures 
Arbitrio popularis aurae. 

Virtus, recludens immeritis mori 
C^lum, negata tentat iter via, 
Coetusque volgares et udam 
Spernit humum fugiente penna. 

Est et fideli tuta silentio 
Merces : vetabo, qui Cereris sacrum 
Volgarit arcanae, sub isdem 
Sit trabibus fragilemve mecum 

Solvat phaselon ; sspe Diespiter 
Neglectus incesto addidit inte.grum : 
Raro antecedentem scelestum 
Deseruit pede Poena claudo. 



the honours which Virtue seeks being acquired by herself alone, cannot 
by others be stained or touched (intaminatis). Cicero has exactly the 
same sentiment (Pro Sestio, 28, 60), and Horace almost literally versifies 
the passage, " Virtus lucet in tenebris — splendetque per sese semper, 
• neque alienis unquam sordibus obsolescit." — See Orelli's note, vol, i. 
p. 345- 



212 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE III. 
ON STEADFASTNESS OF PURPOSE. 

The two preceding odes, addressed to youth, inculcate 
the formation of private character ; this ode and the two 
that follow have a political intention and bearing. In this 
ode Horace commences with his famous picture of the 
steadfast man not turned aside from that which his reason 
and conscience hold to be right, either by the excitement of 
a populace or the threat of a tyrant. Among the mortals 
which the exercise of this virtue has raised to the gods he 
places Augustus, who certainly did not want firmness of pur- 
pose in founding and cementing his authority, and to whom 
the Senate had already decreed the honours habitually paid 
only to the divine powers. The poet's mention of Romulus 
amongst those thus promoted to the rank of immortals, 
leads on to what in itself appears, at first sight, a somewhat 
prolix and irrelevant digression — viz., the speech of Juno 
predicting the glories of Rome, and prohibiting the resto- 
ration of Troy. Closely examined, the digression is not 
purely episodical, but in harmony with the preceding verses, 
and a development of the purpose of the whole poem ; for 
it is in the nature of the steadfast man, unswayed by the 
fickle passions of the time, to adhere firmly to the interests 
of his country, and cherish the memory of its glories and 
heroes. We are told by Suetonius ('Life of Julius Caesar,' ' 
c. 79), that it was a current report that Julius Caesar medi- 
tated a design of transferring the seat of empire from Rome 
to Alexandria, or to Ilium. Lucan, ix. 997, ascribes to him 
the same intention. But we are not to suppose, with some, 
that Augustus entertained any such notion : this ode in 

itself 

Not the rage of the million commanding things evil, 
Not the doom frowning near in the brows of the tyrant, 



BOOK III. — ODE III. 213 

itself is a proof to the contrary ; for Horace would certainly 
not have volunteered a direct opposition to the wish of 
Augustus in poems intended to praise and support his 
policy, and, no doubt, composed with his entire approval. 
But it is possible enough that, when Augustus commenced 
his work of reformation, there were many among the broken 
remains of the old political parties who, whether from the 
dilapidation of their fortune, the distaste for Roman institu- 
tions, the supremacy of Augustus himself and aversion to 
his reforms, the animosities of faction — which, if crushed 
down, were still sore and rankling — or the restless love of 
change and adventure, might have entertained and pro- 
claimed a desire for establishing a settlement in the East, 
for which the ancestral site of Troy would have been a 
popular selection. If Julius Caesar really did entertain, or 
was commonly supposed to have entertained, the design 
imputed to him by Suetonius and Lucan, many of his fol- 
lowers and disbanded soldiers may have shared in this 
project, and rendered it a troublesome subject for Augustus 
to deal with. The idea is not likely to have gone to the 
extent of a transfer of the seat of empire from Rome to 
Troy (nor does Horace intimate that notion in this ode). 
More probably it was confined to establishing at Troy, or 
in its neighbourhood, a colonial or branch government, 
with special privileges and powers. Nor would there have 
been wanting plausible political reasons for thus planting a 
military Roman settlement to guard the empire acquired in 
the East. Upon the assumption that such an idea had 
favourers sufficiently numerous to raise it to importance, 
and that Augustus wished to discourage it, the intention of 
Horace, in the speech he ascribes to Juno, becomes clear. 

Carm. III. 

Justum et tenacem propositi virum 
Non civium ardor prava jubentium. 



214 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Shakes the upright and resolute man 
In his soHd completeness of soul ; 

No, not Auster, the Storm-King of Hadria's wild waters, 
No, not Jove's mighty hand when it launches the thunder ; 
If in fragments were shattered the world, 
Him its ruins would strike undismayed. 

By this virtue* did Pollux and wandering Alcides 
Scale, with toil, starry ramparts, and enter on heaven. 
Whom between, now Augustus reclined. 
Quaffs the nectar that purples his lip ; t 

By this virtue deservedly, thee. Father Bacchus 
Did the fierce tigers draw J with necks tamed by no mortal ; 
By this virtue Quirinus escaped. 

Rapt on coursers of Mars — Acheron : 

Juno having thus spoken words heard with approval 
By the gods met in council, § ' Troy, Troy lies in ruins — 
By a fatal and criminal judge || 

And the false foreign woman o'erthrown ; 

Condemned from the day when LaomedonlT cheated 
Vengeful gods of the guerdon agreed ; — forfeit debtor 
With its people and fraudulent king 
Unto me and Minerva the pure. 

* " Hac arte," "dpexT?," "by the vh-tue of this constancy, unwearied 
by labours, unswerving in purpose, men, becoming the heroes and 
benefactors of the human race, attain to the glory of immortals." — See 
Orelli, note 9 to this ode. 

+ " Purpureo bibit ore nectar." Horace speaks in the present tense, 
and no doubt with reference to the decree of the Senate after the battle 
of Actium — viz., that libations should be offered to Octavian in private 
as well as in public tables, and his name should be inserted in the hymns 
of praise equally with those of the gods. — Dio. 51, 19. Compare Lib. 
IV, Od. v. 33 et seq., and Lib. II. Ep. i. 15. 

X " Vexere tigres" — i.e., to the seats of the gods, to Olympus. The 



BOOK III. — ODE III. 215 

Non voltus instantis tyranni 

Mente quatit solida, neque Auster, 

Dux inquieti turbidus Hadriae, 
Nee fulminantis magna manus Jo vis ; 
Si fractus illabatur orbis, 
Impavidum ferient ruinse. 

Hae arte* Pollux et vagus Hercules 
Enisus arces attigit igneas : 

Quos intef Augustus recumbens 
Purpureo bibit ore nectar.t 

Hae te merentem, Bacche pater, tuae 
Vexere tigres^ indocili jugum 
Collo trahentes. Hae Quirinus 
Martis equis Acheronta fugit, 

Gratum elocuta consiliantibus 
Junone divis : § ' Ilion, Ilion 
Fatalis incestusque judex || 
Et mulier peregrina vertit 

In pulverem ; ex quo destituit deos 
Mercede pacta Laomedon,^ mihi 
Castseque damnatum Minervae 
Cum populo et duce fraudulento. 

tigers are the symbols of the savage ferocity tamed by Bacchus. — 
Orelli. Bacchus is here represented as the civiliser of life. 

§ Met in council to deliberate whether Romulus should be admitted 
among the gods. 

11 Paris adjudging the golden apple to Venus. 
^ " Ex quo destituit deos 
Mercede pacta Laomedon." 
Troy is here represented as doomed by the crime of its founder Laome- 
don, who, according to legend, defrauded Neptune and Apollo of the 
reward promised them for building the walls of the city. It is Laome- 
don who is meant by " the fraudulent king," "duce fraudulento" — not 
Priam, on whom, innocent himself, the fraud of his ancestor is visited. 



2l6 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

But now the vile guest of the Spartan adult'ress 

Glitters forth nevermore ; — the forsworn race of Priam i 

By the aid of its Hector, no more | 
Breaks in fragments the. force of the Greek ; 

Sunk to rest is the war so prolonged by our discords, i 
Ever henceforth to Mars I give up my resentment. 

And my grudge to the grandson^ who springs ■ 

From the womb of a priestess of Troy. \ 

I admit him to enter the luminous dwellings j i 

I admit him to sipt of the juices of nectar, ^ 

And, enrolled in the order serene ' 

Of the gods, to partake of their calm. \ 

While between Rome and Ilion there rage the wide ocean. 
May the exiles be blest wheresoe'er their dominion ; 
So long as the wild herd shall range. 

And the wild beast shall litter her cubs ] 

i 

Undisturbed, 'mid the barrows of Priam and Paris, ] 

May the Capitol stand, brightening earth with its glory, : 

And dauntless Rome issue her laws ] 
To the Mede she subdues by her arms. 

Wide and far may the awe of her name be extended ■ 

To the uttermost shores, where the girdle of ocean 1 

Doth from Africa Europe divide, ) 

And where Nile floods the lands with his swell. ^ 

Be she stronger in leaving disdainfully buried i 

In the caverns of earth the gold — better so hidden, ] 



* Romulus being Juno's grandson, born of Mars her son, and Ilia 
the Trojan priestess. 

+ "Ducere nectaris succos." " Ducere, " z>. , **sorbillere," to sip. 



BOOK III. — ODE III. 217 

Jam nee Lacsenae splendet adulterae 
Famosus hospes, nee Priami domus 
Perjura pugnaees Aehivos 
Heetoreis opibus refringit ; 

Nostrisque duetum seditionibus 
Bellum resedit. Protinus et graves 
Iras, et invisum nepotem, 

Troica quern peperit sacerdos, 

Marti redonabo f ilium ego lucidas 
Inire sedes, ducere nectaris 
SuceoSjt et adscribi quietis 
Ordinibus patiar deorum. 

Dum longus inter saeviat Ilion 
Romamque pontus, qualibet exsules 
In parte regnanto beati ; 

Dum Priami Paridisque busto 

Insultet armentum, et catulos ferae 
Celent inultae, stet Capitolium 
Fulgens, triumphatisque possit 
Roma ferox dare jura Medis. 

Horrenda late nomen in ultimas 
Extendat oras, qua medius liquor 
Seeernit Europen ab Afro, 

Qua tumidus rigat arva Nilus : 

Aurum irrepertum, et sic melius situm 
Cum terra celat, spemere fortior 



— Orelli. Several MS S. have "discere," which reading is favoured 
by Dillenburger, Orelli and Macleane prefer "ducere," "which," as 
the latter observes, *' is in very common use in the sense of ' quaffing.'" 



2l8 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Than in wringing its uses to men, 

With a hand that would plunder the gods/"' 

What limit soe'er may obstruct her in nature 
Let her reach by her arms ; bounding blithely to visit t 
Either pole, where the mist or the sun 
Holds the orgies of water or fire. 

I to Rome's warlike race speak such fates, on condition 
That they never, too pious to antique forefathers, 
Nor confiding too far in their power, 
Even wish Trojan roofs to restore. 

What though Troy could revive under auspices fatal — 
All her fortunes should be repetition of carnage ; 
I myself leading hosts to her doom — 
I the consort and sister of Jove ! 

Rose her brazen wall thrice, with Apollo for founder,:}: 
Still her brazen wall thrice should be razed by my Argives ; 
Thrice the captive wife mourn for her lord, 
Thrice the mother her children deplore. 

Ah, this strain does not chime to my lute's lively measures ! 
Whither tendest thou. Muse? Cease, presumptuous, to mimic 
The discourses of gods ; nor let down 
To a music low-pitched, lofty themes. 



* " Quam cogere humanos in usus 

Omne sacrum rapiente dextra." 
The point here, as Orelli observes, is in the antithesis between " hu- 
manos" and " sacrum." Macleane paraphrases the general meaning of 
the passage thus, — " Let Rome extend her arms as she will, only let 
her not, as her possessions increase, learn to prize gold above virtue." 
The more literal meaning, according to Dillenburger and Orelli, is, that 
in the lust of gold the hand of rapine sacrilegiously despoils the sacred 
vessels dedicated to gods in their shrines and temples. 



BOOK III. — ODE III. 219 

Quam cogere human os in usus. 



Omne sacrum rapiente dextra. 



Quicunque mundo terminus obstitit, 

Hunc tanget armis, visere gestiens,t | 

Qua parte debacchentur ignes, j 

Qua nebulae pluviique rores. j 

Sed bellicosis fata Quiritibus \ 

Hac lege dico ; ne nimium pii , 1 

Rebusque fidentes avitae \ 

Tecta velint reparare Trojse. j 

i 

i 

Trojse renascens alite lugubri j 

Fortuna tristi clade iterabitur, -j 

Ducente victrices catervas j 

Conjuge me Jovis et sorore. 

i 

Ter si resurgat murus aeneus j 

Auctore Phoebo,J ter pereat meis . 

Excisus Argivis ; ter uxor j 

Capta virum puerosque ploret. ; 

Non hoc jocosae conveniet lyrae : : 

Quo, Musa, tendis ? Desine pervicax ' 

Referre sermones deorum et j 

Magna modis tenuare parvis. j 



+ "Visere gestiens." I do not think the commentators or the \ 

translators have sufficiently seized the notion conveyed by "gestiens," I 

which means something more than " delighted" — it means, "showing 1 
delight by active movement," "bounding" or "leaping." " Laetitia 

gestiens," Cic. Tusc. iv, 6. < 

J "Auctore Phoebo," the founder of the first Troy. j 



220 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE IV. 

INVOCATION TO CALLIOPE. 

It is observable that in this ode as well as in the last, and 
in Odes v. and vi., composed for political purposes, Horace 
indulges much more in the flights and fancies and seeming 
digressions proper to poetry purely lyrical than in Odes i. 
and ii., in which, inculcating moral or noble sentiments 
applicable to men of all parties, he is earnestly didactic. 
But treating political subjects, on which men's minds were 
divided, he shows wonderful delicacy of art in conveying 
his purpose through forms of poetry least likely to offend. 
In Ode iii., dissuading from the project of a setdement 
in Troy, it is not he that speaks, it is Juno. In Ode iv., 
desiring to imply that the ascendancy of Augustus is the 
intellectual and godlike mastery over irrational force, he 

begins 
Descend, O Queen Calliope, from heaven. 
And on thy fife discourse in lengthened music ; '* 
Or lov'st thou more the lyre 

By Phoebus strung ; or thrill of vocal song ? 

Hear ye, or doth the sweet delirium fool me ? 
I seem to hear her, and with her to wander 
Where gentle winds and waves 
. Steal their soft entrance into hallowed groves. 

Me, when a child, upon the slopes of Vultur 
Strayed, truant, from my nurse Apulia's threshold,t 
And tired with play and sleep. 

Did mythic doves with budding leaves bestrew ; 

* " Longum — melos." 

" In notes, with many a winding bout 
Of linked sweetness, long drawn out." — Milton. 

Macleane says "longum" means a sustained and stately song. Yonge 
observes, that though it may be so translated, it is enough to understand 



BOOK III. — ODE IV. 221 

begins by an invocation to Calliope, intimating his ambition 
to accomplish a majestic or sustained poem without reveal- 
ing its purport ; passes on to the lovely stanzas descriptive 
of his own devotion to poetry from childhood; links this 
description with inimitable subtlety of touch to Augustus's 
culture of the humanising arts (v. 37, "Vos Caesarem," 
&c.); implies the union of such literary tastes with the 
policy of peace ("militia simul Fessas cohortes addidit 
oppidis," &c.), and with conciliatory and clement disposi- 
tions (" lene consilium," &c). ; and then, with a lyrical sud- 
denness, bursts into the theme for which he had invoked 
the muse at the commencement, — " Scimus ut impios ; " 
insinuating, in the myth of the victory obtained over brute 
force by the gods that represent wisdom (Pallas), industry 
(Vulcan), social and domestic order (Juno), the ennobling 
arts (Apollo), not only the victory of Augustus, but the 
social and civilising influences to which the victory is 
ascribed, and by which it is lastingly maintained. 

Carm. IV. 

Descende caelo, et die age tibia 
Regina longum Calliope melos,*" 
Seu voce nunc mavis acuta, 
Seu fidibus citharaque Phcebi. 

Auditis, an me ludit amabilis 
Insania ? Audire et videor pios 
Errare per lucos, amoense 

Quos et aquae subeunt et aurse. ' 

Me fabulosae Volture in Apulo 
Altricis extra limen Apuliae t 
Ludo fatigatumque somno 

Fronde nova puerum palumbes 

it, with Orelli, as a mode of saying " Come, and leave me not hastily or 
soon. " 
+ See Excursus at the end of the ode. 



222 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

A miracle to all who hold their eyrie 
In beetling Acherontia, or whom forests 
Embower in Bantian glens, 

Or rich Forentum's lowland glebes enclose, 

That, safe from prowling bear and baleful adder — 
That, heaped with myrtle and the hallowing laurel, 
Calm I should slumber on. 

Infant courageous under ward divine. 

Yours, yours am I, O Muses, whether lifted 
To Sabine hills — or whether cool Praeneste, 
Or Tibur's sunny slopes, 

Or limpid Baias '^ more my steps allure. 

The lines arrayed and routed at Philippi, 
The accursed tree, the rock of PaHnurus,t 
Stormed by Sicilian waves. 

Spared me, the lover of your choirs and founts. 

Where ye be with me I would go undaunted ; 
Tempt, a glad mariner, the madding Euxine ; 
Or, a blithe traveller, brave 

The sands that burn upon Assyrian shores ; 

Visit the Briton, terrible to strangers, 
Concanian hordes, drunk with the blood of horses, 
And, safe from every harm. 

Quivered Geloni and the Scythian stream. 

* " Liquidse Baiae." The epithet applies either to the salubrity and 
purity of the waters, or to the clearness of the air at Baias. — Schol. 
Cruq. Orelli prefers the latter interpretation. *' Limpid" appears the 
best translation of " liquidas," being applicable equally to either air or 
water, which " liquid," in our sense of the word, would not be. 



BOOK III. — ODE IV. 223 

Texere, mirum quod foret omnibus, 
Quicunque celsae nidum Acherontiae, 
Saltusque Bantinos, et arvum 
Pingue tenent humilis Forenti ; 

Ut tuto ab atris corpora viperis 
Dormirem et ursis ; ut premerer sacra 
Lauroque coUataque myrto, 
Non sine dis animosus infans. 

Vester, Camenae, vester in arduos 
Tollor Sabinos ; seu mihi frigidum 
Praeneste, seu Tibur supinum, 
Seu liquidae placuere Baise.^ 

Vestris amicum fontibus et choris, 
Non me Philippis versa acies retro, 
Devota non exstinxit arbos. 
Nee Sicula Palinurus unda.t 

Utcunque mecum vos eritis, libens 
Insanientera navita Bosporum 
Tentabo, et urentes arenas 
Litoris Assyrii viator j 

Visam Britannos hospitibus feros 
Et laetum equino sanguine Concanum ; 
Visam pharetratos Gelonos 

Et Scythicum inviolatus amnem. 



t *' Nee Sicula Palinuras unda," Cape Palinurus, a promontory on 
the western coast of Lucania. All attempts to ascertain at what period 
of his life, or on what occasion, Horace escaped shipwreck off Palinurus, 
are but mere conjectures. 



224 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

High Csesar. seeking to conclude his labours, 
Settling in peaceful towns war-wearied cohorts,* 
Ye solace and refresh 

In the Pierian grotto's placid shade. 

Ye are the natural givers of mild counsel, 
Your joy to give it, ye yourselves so gentle ! + 
X We know how He, whose law 

Tempers the sluggish earth and windy sea, 

He who, the Sole One, rules with tranquil justice 
The 'stablished states — the varying crowd of mortals, 
Gods, and the Ghastly Realms — 

Smote with prone bolt the Titans' impious crew, 

And banded giants towering into battle : 
That horrid youth in strength of arm confiding — 
Brethren who sought to pile 

Pelion on dun Olympus, and to Jove 

* " Militia simul 
Fessas cohortes addidit oppidis." 
The MSS. vary in the reading — "addidit," "abdidit," and "reddidit." 
Dillenburger prefers "abdidit," which the scholiasts explain as being 
sent to winter quarters. Orelli powerfully contends for " addidit," as 
significant of new towns or colonies, in favour of which he cites Tacitus, 
Ann. xiii. 31, " Colonise Capua atque Nuceria additis veteranis firmatse 
sunt." After the conquest of the Salassi, a people of the Gaulish Alps 
(a.u.C. 729), Augvistus assigned their territory to the Praetorian troops, 
who built Augusta Praetoria (Aosta). To other troops were assigned 
lands in Lusitania, Augusta Emerita (Merida). Macleane agrees with 
Orelli. The true reading being, however, vincertain, I have left it 
equally vague in the translation. I may observe, however, that as 
Macleane, in common with other eminent commentators, considers this 
ode written between A.u.C. 725 and 728, the line cannot refer to the 
new towns in the territory taken from the Salassi, A.u.C. 729. 
+ * ' Vos lene consilium et datis, et dato 
Gaudetis, almas." 
, * Ye give peaceful counsel, and rejoice in giving it because ye are 
gentle." — Macleane. 



BOOK III.— ODE IV. 225 

Vos Caesarem altum, militia simul 
Fessas cohortes addidit oppidis,"^ 
Finire quaerentem labores, 
Pierio recreatis antro. 

Vos lene consilium et datis, et dato 
Gaudetis, almae.t JScimus, ut impios 
Titanas immanemque turmam 
Fulmine sustulerit caduco, 

Qui terram inertem, qui mare temperat 
Ventosum, et urbes regnaque tristia, 
Divosque, mortalesque turbas 
Imperio regit unus aequo. 

Magnum ilia terrorem intulerat Jovi 
Fidens juventus horrida brachiis, 
Fratresque tendentes opaco 
Pelion imposuisse Olympo. 



+ Here Horace, starting from the picture of Augustus cultivating the 
Muses, and taking from them humane counsels, proceeds with poetic 
abruptness to symbolise the victory of Augustus over the violent and 
irrational forces hostile to the great social interests of man. The 
reader must not suppose (as some critics have inconsiderately done) 
that Horace signifies Augustus himself in the attributes he assigns to 
Jove. He would very imperfectly understand Horace who could con- 
ceive him thus to abase to the level of an earthly vicegerent that supreme 
divinity, to whom there is no likeness and no second. Horace does 
but imply that the same Divine Powers who defeated the brute forces 
of the Titans and giants were on the side of Augustus in the civil 
wars. 



226 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Himself sent fear. But what availed Typhoeus, 
What Mimas or Porphyrion's stand of menace,* 
What Rhoetus, or the bold 

Hurler of trees uptom, Enceladus, 

Rushing against Minerva's sounding aegis ? 
Here, keen, stood Vulcan — here the matron Juno, 
And he, who never more 

Will from his shoulders lay aside the bow, 

Who in the pure dew of Castalia's fountain 
Laves loosened hair,t who holds the Lycian thicket 
And his own native wood, 

Apollo, Delian and Patarean king. 

By its own weight sinks force, when void of counsel. 
'Tis the force tempered which the gods make greater ; 
But they abhor the force 

Which gives blind movement to all springs of crime. 

Witness this truth, the hundred-handed Gyas — 
Witness the doom of Dian's vast assailer, 
Lustful Orion, quelled 

By the chaste conqueror with the virgin shaft. 



* "Aut quid minaci Porphyrion statu." As more poetic and ex- ] 
pressive, I have adopted the literal translation of "status" — i.e., "ai 
standing still," as opposed to motion — rather than that of "attitude,' 
in which sense Forcellini interprets the word in these lines, — an inter- \ 
pretation commended by Yonge. 

+ Every reader of taste will be struck by the exquisite grace with : 
which Horace lingers on this lovely picture of Apollo (Augustus's 
favourite deity), in contrast, as Orelli observes, to the monstrous images 
to which he is opposed. " Delius et Patareus :" Apollo is mythically ; 
said to have resided (or given oracles) at Patara, in Lycia, for six i 
months in the year — the other six at Delos, his native isle. Macleane 
remarks that, ' ' Tn enumerating the principal gods who assisted Zeus in 



BOOK III. — ODE IV. 227 

Sed quid Typhoeus et validus Mimas, 
Aut quid minaci Porphyrion statu, "^ 
Quid Rhoetus, evulsisque truncis 
Enceladus jaculator audax, 

Contra sonantem Palladis aegida 
Possent ruentes ? Hinc avidus stetit 
Vulcanus, hinc matrona Juno, et 
Nunquam humeris positurus arcum, 

Qui rore puro Castalise lavit 
Crines solutos,t qui Lyci^ tenet 
Dumeta, natalemque silvam, 
Delius et Patareus Apollo. 

Vis consili expers mole ruit sua : 
Vim temperatam di quoque provehunt 
In majus ; idem odere vires 
Omne nefas animo moventes. 



Testis mearum centimanus Gyas 
Sententiarum, notus et integrae 
Tentator Orion Dianae, 
Virginea domitus sagitta. 



the battle, Horace means to say, that although they were present, it was 
Pallas to whom the victory is mainly owing, otherwise the force of his 
argument is lost. " But, as is said in the introduction, Horace appears 
to me to have desired emphatically, though symbolically, to intimate the 
nature of the Powers that v/ere ranged on the side of Pallas, i.c.^ in 
the cause of Augustus — Vulcan, the representative of industry — Juno, 
of social order and marriage — x'Vpollo, of arts and letters. This sup- 
position is in accordance with the social or political objects to which 
these odes are devoted, and with the special benefits which Horace else- 
where ascribes to the reign of Augustus. 



228 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Earth heaped above them mourns her buried monsters, 
And wails her offspring, into lurid Orcus 
Hurled by the heavenly bolt ; 

The swiftest fires consume not ^tna, piled 

Over the struggling giant ;"' the winged jailer t 
Of lustful Tityus never quits its captive ; 
Three hundred fetters hold 

The ravisher Pirithous fast in hell. ^ 



Excursus. 

*'Me fabulosse Volture in Apulo 
Altricis extra limen Apuliae 
Ludo fatigatumque somno." 

I omit in the translation the adjective Apulian (Apulo) 
applied to Vultur, because, as between Apulo in one line 
and Apuliae in the next, the text is generally supposed to be 
corrupt. Apu(lo) in the first line, is Apu(lias) in the second; 

and 



* "Necperedit 
Impositam celer ignis ^tnam." 
The fires of ^tna, however swiftly they burst forth, cannot consume 
the heap piled above Enceladus, so as ever to free him, — Orelli. 
Horace does not say who was the giant crushed under .■Etna. Calli- 
machus says it was Enceladus, and also Briareus ; Pindar and -^schylus 
say it was Typhoeus. I have left this question in the translation as 
vague as Horace leaves it, though I have been compelled to take the 
licence of adding the words, "the struggling giant," in order to pre- 
vent a misconception of the meaning, — such as occurs, for instance, 
in Smart, "Nor does the active fire consume ^Etna, that is placed 
over it. " 

+ The vulture. 



BOOK III. — ODE IV. 229 

Injecta monstrls Terra dolet suis, 
Mseretque partus fulmine luridum 
Missos ad Orcum ; nee peredit 
Impositam celer ignis ^Etnam ; * 

Incontinentis nee Tityi jeeur 
Reliquit ales, nequitiae additus 
Gustos jt amatorem treeentae 
Pirithoum cohibent eatense. 



and though there are suffieient instanees of variation of 
quantity in proper names — sueh as Priamus, Priamides, 
Sicanus, Sicania, Italus, &e. — yet it is thought improbable 
that in so elaborate a poem Horace would have varied the 
quantity in two eonseeutive lines. Passing by the proso- 
diaeal objeetion, a graver diffieulty has been found in the 
construetion, " Me in Apulian Vultur beyond the threshold 
of my nurse Apulia." The Apennine range, still ealled 
" Monte Vulture," was partly in Apulia, partly in Lueania. 
And Horace, Satire ii. i, says it is doubtful whether he was 
a Lucanian or an Apulian, for the farmers of Venusia (his 
birthplace) ploughed the boundaries of both these provinces. 
Had he said " Lucanian Vultur," " beyond the threshold of 
Apulia," the passage, therefore, would have been clear ; but 
" in Apulian Vultur, out of Apulia," is a puzzle for com- 
mentators. It is not to be wondered at that Bentley, ever 
ready upon slighter ground to disturb a text and hazard an 
invention, should vehemently repudiate this reading ; and, 
getting rid of Apulia and poetry altogether, boldly pro- 
pose to read, " Nutricis extra limina sedulse," " beyond the 
threshold of my careful nurse." Another critic, still more 
ingenious, not contented with taking " altrix" or -'nutrix" 
literally as Horace's nurse in flesh and blood, has discovered 



230 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

her name to be Pulia, " extra limina Puliae ; " in which case 
the Hnes might be imitated thus : — 

*' Me on the slope of Brighton Downs, 
Beyond the threshold of nurse Downie." 

The most recent and the most plausible conjecture will be 
found in the preface to Mr Yonge's edition, p. vi., " Altricis 
extra limina villulse," " beyond the precincts of my native 
homestead." Mr Yonge suggests, p. vii., a yet bolder, but, 
we think, a less acceptable emendation, "Nutricis extra 
limina villicae," observing, that the " villica" was an impor- 
tant person in a plain country-house — the responsible 
manager for every part of the household arrangements. 
The construction would then be, " beyond the threshold 
of my nurse the bailiff's wife." As the obscurity of this 
passage has tasked the subtlest critics, I feel that I shall 
gratify all Horatian scholars by subjecting the following 
communication from a very high authority : — " I cannot see 
any difficulty about the Apuliae and Apulo ; the adjective 
and substantive often differ in accent, as gallant and gallant. 
Horace claims Vultur as an Apulian mountain, but says 
that he has strayed beyond its Apulian side ; just as a child 
at Macugnaga might say that he had strayed on the * Pied- 
montese Monte Moro ' beyond the limits of Piedmont." 



ODE V. 

THE SOLDIER FORFEITS HIS COUNTRY WHO SURRENDERS 
HIMSELF TO THE ENEMY IN BATTLE. 

In this ode the political object of Horace is to stigmatise 
the Roman soldiers, who, being made prisoners — or, to 
use an appropriate French word, detejws — after the defeat 
of Crassus, had accustomed themselves to the country in 
which they were detained, married into barbarian families, 



BOOK III. — ODE V. 231 

and accepted military service under the conqueror; and 
in thus energetically representing the moral disgrace of 
these men, Horace is very evidently opposing some propo- 
sition then afloat for demanding their restoration from the 
Parthians. Such demand, which would no doubt be urged 
by the relatives of the ^ detenus, and perhaps by many old 
fellow-soldiers in the Roman army, might easily have ac- 
quired the importance of what we call a party question. 
And if Horace here opposes it, it is pretty certain that 
Augustus opposed it also at that time. Hence the ode 
would have been written before Augustus redemanded (a.u.c. 
731) the Roman captives and standards from Phraates. 
And the date a.u.c. 728 or 729, assigned to the ode by 
Orelli, is probably the true one. A demand which circum- 
stances rendered reasonable and politic in 731, might have 
been very inopportune and unwise two or three years be- 
fore. In aiming at his political object, Horace skilfully eludes 
its exact definition. He begins by saying, that as it is by 
his thunder we believe in Jove, so the power of Augustus 
will be recognised when he shall have added the Britons 
and Parthians to his empire. Thus, agreeably with the 
oratorical character of his poetry, on which I have ob- 
served in the preliminary essay, his exordium propitiates 
the ear of the party he is about to oppose — viz., those 
clamorous for the restoration of the Parthian prisoners. 
He follows this exordium with a rapid outburst on the 
ignominy of these very prisoners, and then, with admirable 
boldness, places the argument against their restoration in 
the mouth of the national hero Regulus. It is in these and 
similar passages that Horace not only soars immeasurably 
above the level of didactic poetry properly so called, but 
justifies his claim to a far higher rank even in lyrical poetry 
than many of his modem critics are disposed to accord to 
him. He attains to that region of the sublime which be- 
longs to heroic sentiment, and which is the rarest variety of 
the sublime even in the tragic drama. 



232 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

'Tis by his thunder we believe Jove reigns 
In heaven : on earth,* as a presiding god, 
When to his realm annexed 

Briton and Persian,t Csesar shall be held ! 

What ! hath the soldier who with Crassus served, 
Lived the vile spouse of a barbarian wife ? 
Shame to Rome's Senate ! J shame 

On manners that invert the Rome of old. 

Marsian, Apulian, sons-in-law to foes 
Of their own sires ! grown grey in hireling mail 
Beneath a Median king ! 

Oblivious of the sacred shields of Mars, 

Oblivious both of toga and of name, 
And Vesta's unextinguishable fire, § - 

While yet live Jove and Rome ! || 

Ah ! this the provident mind of Regulus 

Foresaw, when arguing that to buy from Death 
Captives unworthy pity, on vile terms. 
Would serve in after days, 

As the sure precedent of doom to Rome. 

''I," thus he said, "have with these eyes beheld 
The Roman standards nailed to Punic shrines ; 
From Roman soldiers seen 

The bloodless weapons wrenched without a blow ; 

* " ' Praesens divus' is obviously 'prsesens in terris,' as opposed to 
' caslo.' " — Macleane. 

f Persian for Parthian, as Lib. I. Od. ii. 22. 

t "Pro Curia," &c. — viz., "Shame to the Senate for the scandal 
to its dignity in having so long endured a disgrace so ignominious." — 
Orelli. 

§ " Horace collects the most distinguished objects of a Roman's rev- 
erence — his name, his citizenship (togse), the shield of Mars only to be 
lost, and the fire of Vesta only to be extinguished, when Rome should 
perish. " — M ACLEANE. 



BOOK III. — ODE V. 233 



Carm. V. 



Caelo tonantem credidimus Jovem 
Regnare : praesens divus ^ habebitur 
Augustus, adjectis Britannis 
Imperio gravibusque Persis.t 



Milesne Crassi conjuge barbara 
Turpis maritus vixit ? et hostium — 
Pro Curia inversique mores ! J — 
Consenuit socerorum in armis, 



Sub rege Medo, Marsus et Apulus, 
Anciliorum et nominis et togse 
Oblitus, aeternaeque Vestae, § 
Incolumi Jove et urbe Roma ? 



Hoc caverat mens provida Reguli 
Dissentientis conditionibus 
Foedis, et exemplo trahentis 
Perniciem veniens in sevum, 



Si non periret immiserabilis 
Captiva pubes. ' Signa ego Punicis 
Adfixa delubris et arma 
Militibus sine caede,' dixit, 



II "Incolumi Jove." "Salvo CapitoHo," Schol. — viz., the Capitol 
in which stood the temple of Capitoline Jove. 



234 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

" Seen the stout arms of Roman citizens 
Twisted, all slave-like, behind free-born backs, 
While foes retilled safe fields. 

And left expanded portals sentryless. 

" Think ye, forsooth, the soldier whom your gold 
Ransoms from bonds, comes back a braver man ! 
No, you in this but swell 

By a fresh damage, "^ the account of shame. 

" Never the wool drugged by the sea-weed's dye 
Regains the colours lost j never, once fled, 
True valour cares to find 

In the degenerate heart its former place. 

" If, when set free from toils, the dove will fight, 
He will be brave, He trample Carthage down 
In some new battle-field, 

Who hath confided his own recreant self 

" To faithless foes, — felt passive on his wrists 
The gall of thongs, and known the fear of death ; 
Mingling his country's war 

With terms of peace for his own recreant self; 

*' Not even conscious of the only way 
By which in battle soldiers guard their lives.t 
O shame ! great Carthage hail, 

Throned on the ruins of a Rome disgraced ! " 



* " Flagitio additis Damnum." Orelli, Dillenburger, and Macleane 
agree in considering that "damnum" does not refer, as some suppose, 
to the loss of the ransom, but to the damage done by the example of 
ransoming captives who had evinced so httle courage. 
+ * ' Hie, unde vitam sumeret inscius, 
Pacem duello miscuit." 
That is, such a man, not comprehending that it is only by his Qiwsx 



BOOK III. — ODE V. 235 

* Derepta vidi ; vidi ego civium 
Retorta tergo brachia libero, 
Portasque non clausas, et arva 
Marte coli populata nostro. 



Auro repensus scilicet acrior 
Miles redibit ! Flagitio additis 

Damnum.^ Neque amissos colores 
Lana refert medicata fuco, 



Nee vera virtus, cum semel excidit, 
Curat reponi deterioribus. 
Si pugnat extricata densis 
Cerva plagis, erit ille fortis, 



Qui perfidis se credidit hostibus ; 
Et Marte Poenos proteret altero, 
Qui lora restrictis lacertis 

Sensit iners, timuitque mortem. 



Hie, unde vitam sumeret inscius, 
Pacem duello miscuit.t O pudor ! 
O magna Carthago, probrosis 
Altior Italic ruinis ! ' 



unyielding valour that he should save his life, confounds peace and war 
by making peace for himself on the field of battle. Conditions of peace 
belong to the state, not to the individual soldier, upon whom the state 
imposes the duty to fight at any hazard of life. — See Orelli's note. 



^- K 



236 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Then, it is said, he turned from the embrace 
Of his chaste wife and children, as a man 
Of social rites bereft,^ 

A citizen no more, and bent to earth 

In stern humility his manly face, 
Till his inflexible persistence fixed 
The Senate's wavering will ; 

And forth, bewept, the glorious exile passed. 

Albeit he knew what the barbarian skill 
Of the tormentor for himself prepared. 
He motioned from his path 

The opposing kindred, the retarding crowd, ^ 

Calmly as if, some client's tedious suit 
Closed by his judgment,t to Venafrian plains 
Or mild Tarentum, built 

By antique Spartans, went his pleasant way. 



* *' Capitis minor." The expression signifies the man who has lost 
his civil rights, as did the Roman citizen taken prisoner by the enemy. 

+ The patrons were accustomed to settle the dispute between their 
clients. 



BOOK III. — ODE V. 237 

Fertur pudicae conjugis osculum, 
Parvosque natos, ut ca^itisjnciinor,^ 
Ab se removisse, et virilem 
Torvus humi posuisse voltum : 

Donee labantes consilio patres 
Firmaret auctor nunquam alias dato, 
Interque maerentes amicos 
Egregius properaret exsul. 

Atqui sciebat qus sibi barbanis 
Tortor pararet; non aliter tamen 
Dimovit obstantes propinquos, 
Et populum reditus morantem, 

Quam si clientum longa negotia 
Dijudicata lite relinqueret,t 
Tendens Venafranos in agros, 
Aut Lacedaemonium Tarentum. 



238 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE VL 

ON THE SOCIAL CORRUPTION OF THE TIME. 

Macleane observes that, ''As the former (five) odes are 
addressed more to qualities of young men, this refers more 
especially to the vices of young women, and so Horace dis- 
charges the promise with which this series of odes begins." 
To me, on the contrary, it is precisely because of the lines 
which so freely describe the vices of young women, single 
and married, that I hesitate to class this ode among those 
to which the introductory verse of the first ode applies. Let 
any man consider if a poet, as the Muse's priest, could have 

addressed, 
Roman, the sins thy fathers have committed. 
From thee, though guiltless, shall exact atonement, 
Till tottering fanes "'' and temples be restored, 
And smoke-grimed t statues of neglected gods. 

Thou rul'st by being to the gods subjected, 
To this each deed's conception and completion 
Refer ; full many an ill the gods contemned 
Have showered upon this sorrowing Italy. 

Twice have Monaeses J and the Parthian riders 
Of Pacorus crushed our evil-omened onslaught, 
And to their puny torques smiled to add 

The spoils of armour stripped from Roman breasts. 



* The restoration of the temples and fanes decayed by time, or burned 
down in the civil wars, was among the chief reforms of Augustus. — 
Suet, Oct. XXX, 

+ " Smoke-grimed," — partly by conflagrations commemorated by 
Tacitus and Suetonius, partly by the fumes from the sacrifices. Stated 
times for the washing of the statues, with solemn riteS; v/ere appointed. 

J Pacorus, son of the Parthian king Arsaces XIV., defeated Decidius 



BOOK III. — ODE VI. 239 

addressed, in the original, lines from 21 to 32, not to freed- 
women and singing-girls, but to the well-born maidens and 
brides of Rome. That the poem was written about the same 
time as the others is a reasonable conjecture, and probably 
with the same intention of assisting the reforms of Augustus, 
among which Horace subsequently celebrates the stricter 
laws regulating and affecting marriage. But I do not think 
the poem was or could be one of those specially addressed 
to the young ; and, independently of the lines I have referred 
to, the concluding stanza, in fierce condemnation of them- 
selves and their immediate parents, would be very unlike the 
skilful way in which Horace "admissus circum praecordia 
ludit." 

Carm. VI. 

Delicta majorum immeritus lues, 
Romane, donee templa''^ refeceris, 
^desque labentes deorum, et 
Foe da nigro simulacra fumo.t 

Dis te minorem quod geris, imperas : 
Hinc omne principium, hue refer exitum. 
Di multa neglecti dederunt 
Hesperiae mala luctuos^. 

Jam bis Monaeses J et Pacori manus 
]^on auspicatos contudit impetus 
Nostros, et adjecisse praedam 
Torquibus exiguis renidet. 

Saxa, legate to M. Antony. Four years later, when Pacorus was dead, 
the Parthians defeated Antony commanding in person. It is not known 
who is meant by Monaeses. Plutarch mentions a Parthian of that name 
who fled to Antony, but it nowhere appears that he bore arms against 
the Romans. Orelli and Macleane favour the conjecture that by Mon- 
seses is meant Surenas, who defeated Crassus, A.u.c. 701 — supposing 
Surenas to be merely an Oriental title of dignity, and Monoeses to have 
been the proper name of Crassus's conqueror. 



240 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Dacian and Ethiopian,* dread-inspiring — 
One with his archers, with his fleets the other — 
Well-nigh destroyed this very Rome herself, 

While all her thought was on her own fierce brawls. 

This age, crime-bearing, first polluted wedlock, 
Hence race adulterate, and hence homes dishallowed ; t 
And firom this fountain flowed a poisoned stream. 
Pest-spreading through the people and the land. 

The ripening virgin, blushless, learns delighted 
Ionic dances ; in the art of wantons 

Studiously fashioned ; even in the bud. 
Tingles, within her, meditated sin.:}: 

Later, a wife — her consort in his cups. 
She courts some younger gallant, whom, no matter, 
Snatching the moment from the board to slip. 
And hide the lover from the tell-tale lights. § 

Prompt at the beck (her venal spouse conniving) 
Of some man-milliner II or rude sea-captain 

Of trade-ship fresh from marts of pilfered Spain, 
Buying full dearly the disgrace she sells. 



* This is an allusion to the threats of Antony and Cleopatra against 

Rome — 

"Dum Capitolio 
Regina dementes ruinas, 
Funus et imperio parabat." 

— Lib. I. Od. xxxvii. 

The Dacian archers were auxiliaries in Antony's army at Actium. By 
the Ethiopians is meant the Egyptian fleet. The ode must therefore 
have been written after the battle of Actium. 

+ Here Horace, tracing the corruption of the times to the contempt 
of the marriage-tie, whether by adultery or the excess to which the 
licence of divorce was carried, aids Augustus in the reforms he effected 
in the law of marriage. 

X " Jam nunc et incestos amores 

De tenero meditatur ungui." 
I have adhered to the received and simplest interpretation of " de 



BOOK III.— ODE VL 24I 

Pgene occupatam seditionibus \ 

Delevit Urbem Dacus et ^thiops ; j 

Hie classe formidatus, ille j 

Missilibus melior sagittis. I 

Fecunda culpas saecula nuptias , 
Primum inquinavere, et genus, et domos ; t 

Hoc fonte derivata clades , 

In patriam popiilumque fluxit. j 

Motus doceri gaudet lonicos 

Matura virgo, et fingitur artibus ; j 

Jam nunc et incestos amores - 

De tenero meditatur unguijj 

Mox juniores quaerit adulteros 
Inter mariti vina ; neque eligit, 
Cui donet impermissa raptim 
Gaudia, luminibus remotis ; § 

Sed jussa coram non sine conscio 
Surgit marito, seu vocat institor, 1| 
Seu navis Hispanae magister, 
Dedecorum pretiosus emptor. 



terpretation, which OrelU considers very ingenious and appears to ap- 
prove, will be found in his note to the passage, *'penitus ex intimis 
nervis" — as we say in English, " tingling to the finger-ends;" or, as 
the French say, clever or wicked, " au bout des ongles." 
§ " Impermissa raptim 
Gaudia, luminibus remotis." 
** Raptim non est *furtim ' sed ' celeriter,' ita est statim post venerem in 
triclinium redeat," &c. — Orelli. 

II "'Institor,' *an agent, a trader in articles of dress or for the 
toilet.'" — YoNGE. I have translated this " man -milliner," for there 
seems some kind of antithesis intended between the effeminate occupa- 
tions of the "institor" and the rough manners of the shipmaster. 

Q 



1 

242 THE ODES OF HORACE. j 

Not from such parents sprang that race undaunted, 
Who reddened ocean with the gore of Carthage, 
Beat down stout Pyrrhus, great Antiochus, 
And broke the might of direful Hannibal. 

That manly race was born of warriors rustic, : 

Tutored to cleave with Sabine spades the furrow, ' 

And, at some rigid mother's bluff command, 

Shouldering the logs their lusty right hands hewed, ; 

What time the sun reversed the mountain shadows. 

And from the yoke released the wearied oxen, ] 

As his own chariot slowly passed away, ] 

Leaving on earth the friendly hour of rest. - i 

AVhat does time dwarf not and deform, corrupting ! 
Our father's age ignobler than our grandsires' 

Bore us yet more depraved ; and we in turn i 

Shall leave a race more vicious than ourselves. 



BOOK III. — ODE VI. 243 

Non his juventus orta parentibus 
Infecit aequor sanguine Punico, 
Pyrrhumque et ingentem cecidit 
Antiochum, Hannibalemque dirum ; 

Sed msticomm mascula militum 
Proles, Sabellis docta ligonibus 
Versare glebas, et severe 
Matris ad arbitrium recisos 

Portare fustes, sol ubi montium 
Mutaret umbras et juga demeret 
Bobus fatigatis, amicum 

Tempus agens abeunte curru. 

Damnosa quid non imminuit dies ! 
JEtSiS parentum, pejor avis, tulit 
Nos nequiores, mox daturos 
Progeniem vitiosiorem. 



244 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE VIL 

TO ASTERIA. 

This poem tells its own tale. It has that peculiar grace 
in which Horace is inimitable. Orelli says, " On account 
of its elegant pleasantry, and the mode in which the action 
is brought out into evidence — although the whole scene, and 

the 
Nay, Asteria, why weep'st thou for Gyges, 
Whom, enriched with Bithynia's rich cargoes, 
The first sparkling zephyrs of spring 

Shall waft back to thee, constant as ever? 

By the south wind on Oricus driven, 
At the rise of the turbulent goat-star, 

Unsleeping, he weeps, through the night, 
The dull chill of his partnerless pillow. 

But the agent of Chloe, his hostess, 
Tells the youth that in her he has kindled 
A flame no less ardent than thine. 

In a thousand ways craftily tempting :» 

Warns him how the false consort of Proetus 
Duped her credulous lord, by feigned charges. 
Into plotting Bellerophon's death, 

For too chastely regarding his hostess.* 

Tells how Peleus, Hippolytet slighted, 
And was all but consigned to dark Hades ; 

* Proetus, believing the story of his wife Anteia, that Bellerophon had 
attempted to seduce her, but unwilling himself to slay his guest, sent him 
to his father-in-law lobates, king in Lycia, with sealed letters, in which 
lobates was requested to destroy the bearer. 

+ This lady, otherwise called Astydamia, made the same charge 
against Peleus to her husband Acastor that Anteia did to Prd^tus against 



BOOK III. — ODE VII. 245 

the three persons who play their part in it, are pure poetic 
inventions — it may be classed among Horace's happiest 
poems." It is indeed a miniature lyrical comedy, and, slight 
though it be in substance, may be cited as an example of 
the skill with which Horace can give to a few stanzas the 
lively effect of a drama. The date is unknown, but is referred 
by some to a.u.c. 729. 

Carm. VII. 

Quid fles, Asterie, quem tibi candidi 
Primo restituent vere Favonii 
Thyna merce beatum, 
Constantis juvenem fide, 

Gygen? Ille Notis actus ad Oricum 
Post insana Caprae sidera, frigidas 
Noctes non sine multis 
Insomnis lacrimis agit. 

Atqui sollicitae nuntius hospitae, 
Suspirare Chloen, et miseram tuis 
Dicens ignibus uri, 

Tentat mille vafer modis. 

Ut Proetum mulier perfida credulum 
Falsis impulerit criminibus nimis 
Casto Bellerophonti 

Maturare necem, refert* 

Narrat psene datum Pelea Tartaro, 
Magnessam Hippolytent dum fugit abstinens; 

Bellerophon, and for the same reason. Acastor, like Proetus, having 
scruples of conscience which forbade him to slay his guest with his own 
hand, invited Peleus to hunt wild beasts in Mount Pelion ; and when 
Peleus, overcome with fatigue, fell asleep on the mountain, Acastor con- 
cealed his sword, and left him alone and unarmed to be devoured by the 
beasts. Peleus on waking and searching for his sword was attacked by 
Centaurs, but saved by Chiron. 



246 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Then seeks to allure him by tales 

Teaching lessons for sinning in safety : 

All in vain ! To his words is thy true-love 
Deaf as rocks to the breakers Icarian ; 
But keep sharp look-out on thyself, 

Lest too charmed with thy neighbour Enipeus ; 

Though no rider so skilled and so noticed 
Wheels a steed on the turf of the Campus ; * 
No swimmer so lustily cleaves 

Rapid way down the stream of the Tuscan. 

Make thy door fast at eve, never looking 
Down the street if shrill fifes serenade thee ; 
And be but more rigidly cold 

Whensoe'er he complains of thy coldness. 



* " Flectere equum." This was to wheel the horse round in a small 
circle. — Macleane. 



BOOK III. — ODE VII. 247 

Et peccare docentes 
Fallax historias movet : 

Frustra : nam scopulis surdior Icari 
Voces audit adhuc integer. At tibi 
Ne vicinus Enipeus 

Plus justo placeat, cave ; 

Quamvis non alius flectere equum^ sciens 
^que conspicitur gramine Martio, 
Nee quisquam citus seque 
Tusco denatat alveo. 

Prima nocte domum claude ; neque in vias 
Sub cantu querul^ despice tibiae : 
Et te saepe vocanti 
Duram difficilis mane. 



248 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE VIII. 

TO MiECENAS, ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF HORACE'S ESCAPE 
FROM THE FALLING TREE. 

According to Franke, Horace's escape from the tree was 
in A.U.C. 728. Ritter places it in 724. This poem com- 
memorates the anniversary of that accident. 

Learned as thou art in lore of either language,* 
Thou marvellest why these hymeneal Kalends 
Of March t I keep — I, solitary Caelebs, 

"Wherefore these flowerets ? " 

This censer full of incense ? this heaped fuel 
On the live sod ? Know that, escaped the death-blow 
Of the dire tree, I a white goat to Bacchus 
Vowed, and feast-offerings. 

The day, thus sacred, with the year returning, 
Shall free from cork and all its pitch-sealed fastenings 
That jar J which first imbibed the smoke-reek under 
Tullus the Consul. 

In honour of thy friend thus saved, Maecenas, 
Quaff brimming cups — a hundred be the number ; 
Let the gay lights watch with us for the morning, 
Noise and brawl banished. 

Cast off the burden of a statesman's trouble, 
Routed are Cotiso's fierce Dacian armies, 
Mede wroth with Mede, upon fraternal slaughter, 
Wastes his wild fury.§ 

* Viz., Greek and Latin, which, as the commentators observe, com- 
prehended all the learning a Roman could well acquire. 

+ The Matronalia, in honour of Juno Lucina, were held in the March 
Kalends. 



BOOK III.— ODE VIII. 249 



Carm. VIII. 

Martiis cselebs quid agam Kalendis,t 
Quid velint flores et acerra thuris 
Plena, miraris, positusque carbo in 
Cespite vivo, 

Docte sermones utriusque linguae ? * 
Voveram dulces epulas et album 
Libero caprum, prope funeratus 
Arboris ictu. 

Hie dies anno redeunte festus 
Corticem adstrictum pice dimovebit 
Amphorae fumum :|: bib ere institutae 
Consule Tullo. 

Sume, Maecenas, cyathos amici 
Sospitis centum, et vigiles lucernas 
Perfer in lucem : procul omnis esto 
Clamor et ira. 

Mitte civiles super Urbe curas : 
Occidit Daci Cotisonis agmen; 
Medus infestus sibi luctuosis 
Dissidet armis : § 



+ '* Amphorae fumum." The jar, or amphora, was kept in the 
apotheca, and ripened by the smoke from the bath below it. The 
pitch and cork which fastened it protected the wine itself from being 
smoked. The wine in the amphora now to be broached, dating back 
to Tullus the Consul, A.U.C. 683, would have been a year older than 
Horace himself 

§ The precise dates of these historical allusions are matters of contro- 
versy, and not possible to determine. By the Mede is meant the Par- 
thian, distracted by the civil feuds between Phraates and Tiridates. 



250 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Subject to Rome, and curbed in tardy fetters, 
The old Cantabrian foe on shores Hispanian ; 
Lo ! the grim Scythians meditate retreating — 
Lax are their bow-strings. 

As one who takes in private life his leisure, 
A while forego the over-care for nations ; 
Leave things severe ; life offers one glad moment- 
Seize it with gladness. 



BOOK III. — ODE VIII. 251 

Servit Hispanse vetus hostis orae 
Cantaber sera domitus catena : 
Jam Scythae laxo meditantur arcu 
Cedere campis. 

Neglegens, ne qua populus laboret, 
Parce privatus nimium cavere : 
Dona praesentis cape laetus horse, et 
Linque severa. 



252 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE IX. 

THE RECONCILIATION. 

" One of Buttmann's remarks with reference to this Ode 
is well worth quoting : ' The ancients had the skill to con- 
struct such poems so that each speech tells us by whom it 
is spoken ; but we let the editors treat us all our lives as 
schoolboys, and interline such dialogues after the fashion of 
our plays with the names. To their sedulity we are in- 
debted 
He. 

" While I yet to thee was pleasing, 

While no dearer youth bestowed lavish arms round thy 
white neck, 
Happy then, indeed, I flourished. 

Never Persian king * was blest with such riches as were 
mine." 

She. 

" While no other more inflamed thee, 

And below no Chloe's rank Lydia in thy heart was 
placed. 
Glorious then did Lydia flourish, 

Roman Ilia's lofty name not so honoured as was 
mine." t 

He. 
" O'er me now reigns Thracian Chloe, 

Skilled in notes of dulcet song and the science of the 
lute ; 



* ** Persarum vigui rege beatior." The opposition between the lover's 
comparison in this stanza and the girl's in the next (*' Romana vigui 



BOOK III. — ODE IX. 253 

debted for the alternation of the lyrical name Lydia with 
the name Horatius in this exquisite work of art ; and yet 
even in an English poem we should be offended by seeing 
Collins at the side of Phyllis." — Macleane. 

The poem itself is, perhaps, an imitation from the Greek. 
Macleane observes, " It is just such a subject as one might 
expect to find among the erotic poetry of the Greeks." 



Carm. IX. 

* Donee gratus eram tibi, 

Nee quisquam potior brachia candid^ 
Cervici juvenis dabat, 

Persarum vigui rege beatior.' ''^ 

* Donee non alia magis 

Arsisti, neque erat Lydia post Chloen, 
Multi Lydia nominis 

E-omana vigui clarior Ilia.'t 

* Me nunc Thressa Chloe regit, 

Dulces docta modos, et citharse sciens ; 



clarior Ilia") is this : The lover means that he was richer in her love 
than the wealthiest king ; the girl that she (the humble freed-woman) 
was more honoured in his love than the most illustrious matron. 

t Ilia, as the mother of Romulus, queen and priestess, stands here as 
the noblest type of Roman matrons, " Romanorum nobilissima." 



254 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

I 
If my death her life could lengthen, ! 

So that Fate my darling spared, I without a fear could : 
die."* I 

She. : 

I 
" From a mutual torchlight kindled \ 

Is my flame for Calais, son of Thurian Ornytus,+ 

If my death his life could lengthen, 

So that Fate would spare the boy, I a double death 

would die ! " 

He. 

" What if Venus fled — returning, 

Forced us two, dissevered now, back into her brazen j 

yoke; ! 

If I shook off auburn Chloe, I 

And to Lydia, now shut out, opened once again the \ 

door?" I 

1 
She. i 

" Than a star though he be fairer. 

Lighter thou than drifted cork — rougher thou than 
Hadrian wave, J 
Yet how willingly I answer, ^ 

'Tis with thee that I would live — gladly I with thee ] 
would die." ' 



* "Si parcent animse fata superstiti." "Animae mese" denotes a 
familiar expression of endearment, as in Cicero, ad. Fam. xiv. 14 ; and 
as the Italians still call their mistress, ' ' Anima mia." 

f "Thurini Calais — Thressa Chloe." The alliteration between the 
names here selected seems studied. In making Chloe a Thracian and 
Calais the son of a Sybarite (Thurium, a town of Lucania, near the site 
of the ancient Sybaris), the poet perhaps insinuates that the lady who 
had replaced Lydia was somewhat too rude or masculine — the gentle- 



BOOK III. — ODE IX. 255 

Pro qua non metuam mori, 

Si parcent animae fata superstiti.' ^ 

* Me torret face mutua 

Thurini Calais filius Omytijf 
Pro quo bis patiar mori, 

Si parcent puero fata superstiti.' 

' Quid, si prisca redit Venus 

Diductosque jugo cogit aeneo? 
Si flava excutitur Chloe, 

Rejectaeque patet janua Lydiae?' 

* Quamquam sidere pulchrior 

lUe est, tu levior cortice et improbo 
Iracundior Hadria,t 

Tecum vivere amem, tecum obeam libens.' 



man who had replaced the lover of the dialogue somewhat too soft 
and effeminate. 

X "Improbo — Hadria." Orelli interprets " improbo " by " /<?(5^;zfl!'," 
"raging." The poets use the word " improbus" to imply anything jn 
violent excess. Ritter, with perhaps over-subtlety, considers that the 
comparison to a cork refers, not to levity of temperament, but to the 
insignificant stature of the poet in contrast to the beauty of Calais, 



256 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE X. 

TO LYCE. 

This humorous ode belongs to a kind of serenade com- 
mon enough with the Greeks, and is probably imitated from 
a Greek original. There is no reason for supposing the 
Lyce whose cruelty is here complained of, to be identical 
with the Lyce who is lampooned in Book IV. Ode xiii. 

Didst thou drink the iced water of uttermost Don, 
O Lyce ! of some cruel savage the spouse, 
Still, thy heart with compassion might think of me stretched 
Where the north winds are quartered outside of thy door. 

Hark ! the hinge of thy gate ; hark ! the plants in thy hall,*" 
With what dissonant howl they re-echo the blasts, 
And, oh ! how the chaste congelation of air 
Adds a yet purer coating of frost to the snow ! 

Lay the haughtiness hateful to Venus aside, 

I^est the wheel should run back and the rope should be 

snapped, t 
Thy good Tyrrhene father ne'er meant to beget 
A Penelope cruel to suitors in thee. 

Ah ! although thou art proof against presents and prayers, 
And the pale-blue complexion of lovers disdained ; 
Nor ev'n bowed to revenge on the spouse led astray 
By a roving Pierian J less chaste than a Muse ; 



* "Nemus Inter pulchra satum tecta." Small trees were sometimes 
planted round the impluvium of a Roman house. This is the interpre- 
tation adopted by Orelli. Ritter contends that the line refers to one of 
the two sacred groves situated between the two heights of the Capitoline. 



BOOK III. — ODE X. 257 



Carm. X. 

Extremum Tanain si biberes, Lyce, 
Saevo nupta viro, me tamen asperas 
Porrectum ante fores objicere incolis 
Plorares Aquilonibus. 

Audis quo strepit janua, quo nemus 
Inter pulchra satum tecta"^ remugiat 
Ventis, et positas ut glaciet nives 
Puro numine Juppiter ? 

Ingratam Veneri pone superbiam. 
Ne currente retro funis eat rota.t 
Non te Penelopen difficilem procis 
Tyrrhenus genuit parens. 

O quamvis neque te munera, nee preces, 
Nee tinctus viola pallor amantium, 
Nee vir Pieria pellicej saucius 
Curvat, supplicibus tuis 



+ " Ne currente retro funis eat rota." This line has been tortured to 
many interpretations. " Lest the wheel turn back and the rope with it, " 
is Orelli's, accepted by Macleane, who observes, the metaphor in that 
case is taken from a rope wound round a cylinder, which, being allowed 
to run back, the rope runs down, and the weight or thing attached goes 
with it. " The rope may break and the wheel run back," is the con- 
struction Macleane gives in his argument to the ode. 

X " Pieria pellice," Macedonian lady of pleasure. — Orelli, Ritter. 
There is some humour as well as wit in coupling "pellice" with an 
epithet so suggestive of an opposite idea. 

R 



258 THE ODES OF HORACE. j 

Yet, granting thy heart be not softer than oak, ] 

Nor gentler than snakes — as a goddess, at least, j 

Spare the life of a suppliant ! I am of flesh, j 

And can bear not for ever this porch and that sleet* j 



* " Aquae Caelestis patiens." The expression can scarcely apply to 
rain, since the night has been described as one of wind and frost : — ' 

'* Glaciet nives 
Pure numine Juppiter;" 
**puro" being, as Macleane observes, "an epithet well suited to a! 
clear, frosty night." The wind would keep off the snow, but there I 
might be gusty showers of sleety hail. Horace, however, no doubt, 
uses the expression in a general sense, such as the ' ' floods of heaven, " 1 
whether they be snow, rain, or sleet. , 



BOOK III.— ODE X. 259 

Parcas, nee rigida mollior aesculo 
Nee Mauris animum mitior anguibus. 
Non hoe semper erit liminis aut aquae 
Caelestis patiens* latus. 



26o THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XI. 

TO THE LYRE. 

" The common inscription, ' Ad Mercurium ' (To Mer- 
cury), adopted by Bentley and others, is plainly wrong, and 
calculated to mislead. The inscription should be 'Ad 

testitudinem' 
Mercury (for, tutored in thy lore, Amphion 
Charmed into motion rocks by his sweet singing), 
And thou, my lyre, with sevenfold chord resounding 
Measures not skill-less, 

Albeit once, unmusical, unheeded,* 
Now welcome both in banquet-halls and temples, 
Teach me some strain resistlessly beguiling 
Lyde to listen. 

Wild as the filly in its third year, frisking 
Through the wide meadows, the least touch dismays her ; 
Never yet won, she views as saucy freedom 
Even the wooing. 

But thout hast power to lead away the tigers. 
And in their train the forests ; stay swift rivers ; 
Cerberus himself, dread jailer of dark thresholds. 
Soothed into meekness, 

Yielded to thy bland voice his hundred strongholds 
Of fury-heads, each garrisoned with serpents. 
And hushed the triple tongue in jaws whose breath-reek 
Tainted the hell-gloom ; 

* " Nee loquax," /. ^'. , " canora," — DiLLENBURGER, Orelli. Ho- 
race, though a born poet, if ever there was one — and telling us that even 
as an infant, when the doves covered him with bay and myrtle, he was 
marked out for the service of the Muses— does not disdain, here and else- 



BOOK III. — ODE XL 26 1 

testitudinem ' (to the lyre or shell), if anything, for Ivlercur}- 
disappears after the first two verses. The miracles alluded 
to, except Amphion's, were those of Orpheus, and of the 
lyre in his hands, not Mercury's — which Orelli not perceiv- 
ing, contradicts himself." — Macleane. 

Carm. XI. 

Mercuri, nam te docilis magistro 
Movit Amphion lapides canendo, 
Tuque, Testudo. resonare septem 
Callida nervis, 

Nee loquax"^' olim neque grata, nunc et 
Divitum mensis et amica templis ; 
Die modos, Lyde quibus obstinatas 
Applicet aures : 

Quae, velut latis equa trima campis, 
Ludit exsultim metuitque tangi, 
Nuptiarum expers et adhuc protervo 
Cruda marito. 

Tut potes tigres comitesque silvas 
Ducere, et rivos celeres morari ; 
Cessit immanis tibi blandienti 
Janitor aulae, 

Cerberus, quamvis furiale centum 
Muniant angues caput ejus, atque 
Spiritus teter saniesque manet 
Ore trilingui. 



where, to intimate that, if a born poet, he had taken very great pains to 
make himself a good one. 

t " Thou" refers not to Mercury, but to the lyre — i.e., symbolically 
to the power of song and music, as exercised by Orpheus. 



262 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

The tortured lips of Tityos and Ixion 
Reluctant smiled ; awhile their urn stood thirsting 
As paused the Danaids, to the charmer's music 
Dreamily listening. 

Let Lyde hear the guilt of those stem virgins, 
Hear, too, their well-known penance ; doomed for ever 
To toil at filling up a sieve-like vessel ; 
Tell her how surely 

Slow fates await such crimes, — though under Orcus ; 
Impious — for can impiety be greater ? 
Impious in giving to the sword their bridegrooms, 
Ruthlessly murdered.* 

Amidst the many, One alone was worthy 
The nuptial torch ; — a maid, through all the ages. 
By glorious falsehood to her perjured father. 
Nobly immortal. 

" Rise," to her youthful bridegroom, thus she whispered ; 
" Rise, lest there come, and whence thou dost suspect not, 
Into thy lids the everlasting slumber ! 
Baffle my father ; 

" Elude my blood-stained sisters — lionesses ; 
Each — woe is me ! — her separate victim rending : 
Of softer mould, I can nor strike nor pen thee 
Here, in these shambles ! 



* The old mythologists differ among themselves as to the fable of 
Danaus and the fate of his daughters. Horace here adopts the com- 
mon stoiy that Danaus, having reason to think that the fifty" sons of his 
brother ^Egyptus were plotting against him, fled with his fifty daughters 
from Libya (the domain assigned him by his father Belus, ^gyptus 
having Arabia), and ultimately became King of Argos. His nephews 
came to his new realm and demanded his daughters in marriage. 



BOOK III. — ODE XI. 263 

Quin et Ixion Tityosque voltu 
Risit invito j stetit urn a paullum 
Sicca, dum grato Danai puellas 
Carmine mulces. 

Audiat Lyde scelus atque notas 
Virginum poenas, et inane lymphae 
Dolium fundo pereuntis imo, 
Seraque fata, 

Quae manent culpas etiam sub Oreo. 
Impiae, nam quid potuere majus ? 
Impise sponsos potuere duro 
Perdere ferro ! * 

Una de multis, face nuptiali 
Digna, perjurum fuit in parentem 
Splendide mendax, et in omne virgo 
Nobilis sevum, 

'Surge,' quae dixit juveni marito, 
* Surge, ne longus tibi somnus, unde 
Non times, detur ; socerum et scelestas 
Falle sorores ; 

Quae velut nactas vitulos leaenae 
Singulos eheu lacerant : ego illis 
Mollior nee te feriam neque intra 
Claustra tenebo. 



Danaus consented, but, in distrust or revenge, enjoined his daughters 
to murder their bridegrooms with the swords he gave them for that 
amiable purpose. One alone, Hypermnestra, spared her husband, 
Lynceus. According to the earlier writers, the Danaides were puri- 
fied of their crime, and even married again. Later poets, deeming it 
perhaps more prudent to make a severe example of such dangerous 
bed-fellows, sent them to Orcus. 



264 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

" Let my sire load me with his barbarous fetters, 
Wroth with the pitying love that spares a husband, 
Or ship me outlawed to Numidian deserts I 
Be it so ! Hasten ! 

" Go wheresoe'er fleet foot or sail can bear thee ; 
Blest be the auspice ! Night and Venus favour ! 
Go, but remember me, and this sad story 
Carve on my tombstone ! " "^ 



* It is pleasant to think that the modem law of what is called 
' ' poetic justice," has a precedent in the final restoration of this young 
lady to the arms of the husband she had so mercifully spared. Pro- 
bably she was the ugly one of the family, and less likely, if she killed 
one husband, to find another. Ovid's Epistle of Hypermnestra to 
Lynceus, supposed to be written while imprisoned by her father, is much 
indebted to Horace's lines. But perhaps both poets borrowed from a 
common source which is lost to modern discoverers. 



BOOK III. — ODE XI. 265 

Me pater saevis oneret catenis, 
Quod viro clemens misero pepercl ; 
Me vel extremes Numidarum in agros 
Classe releget. 

I, pedes quo te rapiunt et aurse, 
Dum favet nox et Venus : I secundo 
Omine, et nostri memorem sepulcro 
Scalpe querelam.''"' 



266 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XII. 

neobule's soliloquy. ] 

Most of the earlier commentators took it for granted that j 

the poet is here addressing Neobule. Dillenburger, Orelli, \ 
and Macleane prefer to consider that Neobule is throughout 

the 

How unhappy the lot of poor girls ; neither play to their : 

fancies in love, 
Neither balm for their sorrows in wine ! frightened out of 

their souls by the lash I 

In the tongue of some testy relation.* j 

! 

Neobule, winged Love has flown off with thy spindles and j 

basket of wools ! ■] 

And thy studious delight in the toils of Minerva is chased | 

from thy heart j 

By young Hebms, the bright Liparaean. \ 

I 

Hardy swimmer in Tiber to plunge gleaming shoulders ] 

anointed with oil ! i 

Sure, Bellerophon rode not so well ; as a boxer no arm is ,' 

so strong ; j 

And no foot is so fleet as a runner. ^ 

Skilful marksman, when over the champaign the hounds 

drive and scatter the deer, 

To select the right stag for his dart ; and as nimble to start ] 

the wild boar, i 

Lurking grim in the dense forest-thicket. " 



* Literally "uncle." "Uncles," Torrentius observes, **had consid- 
erable power over their nephews and nieces by the Roman law, and, 
being less indulgent than fathers, their severity passed into a proverb." 



BOOK III. — ODE XIL 26/ 

the ode addressing herself. The poem is, perhaps, more or 
less imitated from one by Alcaeus, of which only a single 
verse is preserved. The metre of the ode has given much 
trouble to commentators, especially to those who insist upon 
the theory that all Horace's odes are reducible to quatrain 
stanzas, while this ode is in a stanza of three lines, accord- 
ing to the authority of MSS. (with the exception of the 
Turinese one). An attempt to remodel it into quatrain will 
be found in Orelli's excursus to the ode, and is adopted by 
Yonge in his edition. 

Carm. XII. 

Miserarum est neque amori dare ludum, neque dulci 
Mala vino lavere, aut exanimari metuentes 
Patruae verbera linguae.* 

Tibi qualum Cythereae puer ales, tibi telas 
Operosasque Minervae studium aufert, Neobule, 
Liparaei nitor Hebri, 

Simul unctos Tiberinis humeros lavit in undis, 
Eques ipso melior Bellerophonte, neque pugno 
Neque segni pede victus ; 

Catus idem per apertum fugientes agitato 
Grege cervos jaculari, et celer alto latitantem 
Fruticeto excipere aprum. 



268 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIII. 

TO THE BANDUSIAN FOUNTAIN. 

The site of this fountain has been a matter of controversy, 
interesting to those who seek to ascertain the locahties of 
places endeared to them by the poets. Acron and others 
assumed it to be in the neighbourhood of Horace's Sabine 
home, and identify it with the rivulet of Digentia (Licenza). 
It is, however, generally now agreed, upon what appears 
sufficiently competent authority, that Bandusia was in 
Horace's native soil, about six miles from the site of 

Venusia 

Fount of Bandusia, more lucid than crystal, 
Worthy of honeyed wine, not without flowers, 
I will give thee to-morrow a kid, 

Whose front, with the budded horn swelling, 

Predicts to his future life Venus 'and battles ; 
Vainly ! The lymph of thy cold running waters 
He shall tinge with the red of his blood. 
Fated child of the frolicsome people ! 

The scorch of the dog-star's fell season forbears thee ; 
Ever friendly to grant the sweet boon of thy coolness 
To the wild flocks that wander around. 
And the oxen that reek from the harrow. 

I will give thee high rank and renown among fountains, 
When I sing of the ilex o'erspreading the hollows 
Of rocks, whence, in musical fall,"^ 
Leap thy garrulous silvery waters. 



* "Me dicente cavis impositam ilicem Saxis" — the cavern over- 
shadoAved with the ilex from which the fountain gushes.— Orelli. 



BOOK III.— ODE XIII. 269 

Venusia (Dillenburger, Orelli, Macleane). If so, it is con 
jectured that the poem would have been written in earher 
Hfe, when Horace revisited his native spot — perhaps a.u.c. 
717 — since it is held scarcely probable that he would have 
thought of consecrating the fountain in Venusia, when he 
was settled in the remote district of his Sabine farm. It 
may, however, be likely enough, as Tate contends (Horat. 
Restit. p. 88), that Horace transferred the name, endeared 
to him by early association, to the spring near his later home. 
Yonge suggests the query, " Was Bandusia the name of the 
place, or of the presiding nymph of the fountain ? " — See 
Orelli's full and very elegant note on this subject. 



Carm. XIII. 

O fons Bandusiae, splendidior vitro, 
Dulci digne mero non sine floribus, 
Cras donaberis haedo, 

Cui frons turgida comibus 

Primis et venerem et proelia destinat ; 
Frustra : nam geHdos inficiet tibi 
Rubro sanguine rivos 
Lascivi suboles gregis. 

Te flagrantis atrox hora Caniculae 
Nescit tangere ; tu frigus amabile 
Fessis vomere tauris 
Praebes, et pecori vago. 

Fies nobilium tu quoque fontium, 
Me dicente cavis impositam ilicem 
Saxis,* unde loquaces 
Lymphae desiliunt tuae. 



2/0 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIV. 

" Composed at the close of the Cantabrian war, a.u.c. 
729, when Augustus's return was expected, or on his return 
the following year." — Macleane. 

In noticing the critical animadversions on this ode "as 

unequal 
Joy, O ye people ! it was said that Caesar 
Went forth like Hercules, in quest of laurels 
Bought but by death ; now home from shores Hispanian 
Comes he back victor. 

Let her whose joy in her sole lord is centred '^ 
Join, in thanksgivings due, the glad procession — 
Join with the sister of our glorious chieftain — 
Join with the mothers. 

Chastely adorned by sacrificial fillets t — 
Mothers of children now no more imperilled ; 
Youths and young brides hush, at such time ill-omened, 
Each lighter whisper. 

Truly to me this holiday is sacred. 
And its bright sunshine chases cloudy troubles. 
I fear nor open brawl nor stealthy murder, J 
Cassar yet living ! 

Up, boy, and bring the perfume and the garlands, 
And wine that to the Marsian war bears witness, 
If one jar, baffling Spartacus the Rover, 
Somewhere lurks hidden. § 

* " Unico gaudens mulier marito." See Orelli's note on "unico," 
which some have interpreted in the sense of "unique" or "peerless ;" 
Dillenburger, as "dear" or "beloved." 

+ Worn by the Roman matrons to distinguish them from freed women. 
J " Nee tumultum, 
Nee mori per vim metuam." 
"Tumultum" here evidently means "intestine feud" or "popular out- 
break;" "vim," "assassination" or "personal violence." With Caesar 
is identified the prevailing security of law. 



BOOK III. — ODE XIV. 271 

unequal to the occasion," Macleane observes justly that 
"it was evidently only a private affair." The familiar light- 
ness of the concluding stanzas would indicate a merry-mak- 
ing kept with a few personal friends. 

Carm. XIV. 

Herculis ritu modo dictus, O Plebs, 
Morte venalem petiisse laurum, 
Caesar Hispana repetit Penates 
Victor ab ora. 

Unico gaudens mulier marito* 
Prodeat, justis operata sacris ; 
Et soror clari ducis, et decorae 
Supplice vitta 

Virginum matres, juvenumque nupert 
Sospitum. Vos, O pueri et puellae 
Jam virum expertas, male ominatis 

Parcite verbis. 
Hie dies vere mihi festus atras 
Eximet curas ; ego nee tumultum, 
Nee mori per vim metuam,J tenente 

Caesare terras. 

I, pete unguentum, puer, et coronas, 
Et cadum Marsi memorem duelli, 
Spartacum§ si qua potuit vagantem 
Fallere testa. 



§ " The Marsic or Social war was continued from A.u.c. 663 to 665 ; 
and the Servile war, headed by Spartacus, lasted from A.U.C. 681 to 683 ; 
therefore the wine Horace wanted would have been sixty-five years old 
at least. There seems to have been something remarkable in the vin- 
tage of that period, so as to make it proverbial ; for Juvenal, one hun- 
dred years afterwards, speaking of the selfish gentleman who keeps his 
best wine for his own drinking, says : — 

' Ipse capillato diffusum consule potat, 
Calcatamque tenet bellis socialibus uvam.' " 

— S. V. 30, 8g. — Macleane. 



272 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Go, and bid silver-tongued Nesera hasten, 
Binding in Spartan knot her locks myrrh-scented 
But, if obstructed by that brute her porter. 
Quietly come back. 

Nothing cools fiery spirits like a grey hair ; 
In every quarrel 'tis your sure peacemaker ; 
In my hot youth, when Plancus was the consul, 
I was less patient, t 



* "Myrrheum crinem." The scholiasts interpreted this expression 
"myrrh-coloured." Orelli and other recent commentators support the 
interpretation *' myrrh-scented." 

t I. e.y when Horace was in his twenty-third year. 



BOOK III. — ODE XIV. 273 

Die et argutae properet Neaer^ 
Myrrheum nodo cohibere crinem ; * 
Si per invisum mora janitorem 
Fiet, abito. 

Lenit albescens animos capillus 
Litium et rixae cupidos protervae ; 
Non ego hoc ferrem calidus juventa,t 
Consule Planco. 



274 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XV. I 

ON AN OLD WOMAN AFFECTING YOUTH. ' 

The names in this poem are, of course, fictitious, and the 
satire itself is of very general application even in the pre- i 
sent day. Its date is undiscoverable. ] 

Mend thy life — it is time ; cease such pains to be vile, ; 

Flaunting wife of the indigent Ibycus ; i 

Fitter far for the grave, do not gambol with girls, | 

Interspersing a cloud 'mid the galaxy. J 

That which Pholoe thy daughter may suit well enough, 

In thee, hoary Chloris, is horrible : * 
'Tis permitted to her to besiege the young rakes ] 

In their homes, with much greater propriety : i 

i 

No Bacchante the timbrel excites with its clash, ; 

Than that daughter of thine can be livelier; | 

And now that with Nothus she's fallen in love, | 

Not a roe on the hills is more frolicsome. • 

What becomes thee the best is a warm woollen dress ; 

Get thee fleeces from famous Luceria ; t : 

What become thee the least are the lute and the rose, < 

And the cask tippled dry with young rioters. 



* *• Anus cum ludit, Morti delicias facit." — P. Syrus. 

+ A town in Apulia now called Lucera. In its neighbourhood was 
one of the largest tracts of public pasture-land. The wools of Luceria 
were celebrated. 



BOOK III. — ODE XV. 275 



Carm. XV. 

Uxor pauperis Ibyci, 

Tandem nequitise fige modum tuae, 
Famosisque laboribus : 

Maturo propior desine funeri 

Inter ludere virgines, 

Et stellis nebulam spargere candidis. 
Non, si quid Pholoen satis, 

Et te, Chlori, decet :* filia rectius 

Expugnat juvenum domos, 

Pulso Thyias uti concita tympano. 

Illam cogit amor Nothi 

Lascivae similem ludere capreae : 

Te lanse prope nobilem 

Tonsae Luceriam,t non citharse, decent 
Nee flos purpureus rosae, 

Nee poti, vetulam, fece tenus cadi. 



2/6 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XVI. 

GOLD THE CORRUPTOR. 

This ode is among Horace's most striking variations of 
the moral he so frequently preaches — content versus gold. 
But here he does full justice to the power of gold as the 
corruptor. I have not adopted for this ode the forms of 
metre I have elsewhere employed for rendering odes in the 

same 
The brazen tower, the solid doors/"' the vigil 
Of dismal watch-dogs sentried night and day, 
Might have sufficed to guard 

From midnight loves imprisoned Danae; 

But Jove and Venus laughed to scorn Acrisius, 
The timorous jailer of the hidden maid,t 
Opening at once sure way. 

The god transformed himself into — a Bribe. 

More subtle than the flash of the forked lightning. 
Gold glides amidst the armed satellites ; 
More potent than Jove's bolt, 

Gold through the walls of granite bursts its way : 

So fell the Argive Augur with his kindred, % 
Gain, tempting one, whelmed in destruction all ; 
The man of Macedon § 

By gifts cleft gates, by gifts sapped rival thrones — 

Gifts baited for fierce admirals, net whole navies ; || 
Care grows with wealth, with wealth the greed for more. 

* "Robustseque fores." Orelli suggests " firmissimae," and objects, 
not without fine critical taste, to the interpretation of Forcellini and 
others — viz., " oaken doors," as a descent in poetic expression, just after 
insisting on "brazen tower." Certainly, in line 9, Ode iii., "Illi robur 
et ses triplex," "robur" comes first. 

+ Acrisius shut up his daughter in a brazen toAver from fear of the 
oracle, who had predicted that she should bear him a son who would 
cause his death. He is therefore timorous or panic-stricken (pavidus) 
because of the oracle. 



BOOK III. — ODE XVI. 277 

same measure (Asclepiadean, with a Glyconean in the 4th 
Hne), but one by which I have not unfrequently rendered 
the Alcaic stanza, with the sHght variation of a monosyllabic 
termination in the second verse, while the termination of the 
first verse is dissyllabic. 

Carm. XVI. 

Inclusam Danaen turris aenea 
Robustaeque fores,* et vigilum canum 
Tristes excubise munierant satis 
Nocturnis ab adulteris, 

Si non Acrisium virginis abditset 
Custodem pavidum, Juppiter et Venus 
Risissent : fore enim tutum iter et patens 
Converso in pretium deo. 

Aurum per medios ire satellites, 
Et perrumpere amat saxa potentius 
Ictu fulmineo : concidit auguris 
ArgiviJ domus ob lucrum 

Demersa exitio ; diffidit urbium 
Portas vir Macedo,§ et submit semulos 
Reges muneribus ; munera navium 
Saevos illaqueant duces. || 

Crescentem sequitur cura pecuniam 
Majorumque fames. Jure perhorrui 

+ Amphiaraus ; his wife Eriphyle. Ijribed by her brother Polynices, 
persuaded him to join in the siege of Thebes. There he fell, ordering 
his sons to put their mother to death. Alcmaeon obeyed, and finally 
perished himself in attempting to get the gold necklace with which Eri- 
phyle had been bribed. 

§ Philip of Macedon. 

II This is held to refer to Menas, alias Menodorus, commander of 
Sextus Pompeius's fleet. Pie deserted from Pompeius to Augustus, then 
again to Pompeius, and again to Augustus. He had been freed-man to 
C. M. Pompeius. 



278 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

O my Maecenas ! gem 

Of Roman knighthood,"^ ever have I feared 

To hft a crest above the crowd conspicuous — 
Rightly; the more man shall deny himself, 
The more shall gods bestow. 

I do not side with wealth, but, lightly armed, 

Bound o'er the lines, deserting to Contentment ; 
Owner more grand in means the rich despise, 
Than were I said to hide. 

In mine own granaries, all Apulia yields 

Her toiling sons, want-pinched amidst heaped plenty 
A brooklet pure, some roods of woodland cool, 
Faith in crops, sure if small — 

Are a lot happier, though he knows it not. 

Than his who glitters in the spoils of Afric. 
Though not for me toil the Calabrian bees. 
Nor wines in Formian jars 

Languish their fire in length of years away, 

Nor fleecy wools gain weight in Gallic pastures. 
Yet Penury keeps aloof; nor, lacked I more, 
More wouldst thou me deny : 

Widening my means by narrowing my desires, 

I shall have ampler margin for true riches 

Than if to Lydia adding Phrygian realms. 

Who covets much, much wants ; 

God gives most kindly giving just enough. 



* " Maecenas, equitum decus." By this significant reference to 
Maecenas as the ornament of knighthood, Horace associates Maecenas 
with himself in the philosophy of contentment — Maecenas, having always 
remained in the equestrian order, to which he was born, declining pro- 
motion to the senatorial. 



BOOK III. — ODE XVI. 279 

Late conspicuum tollere verticem, 
Maecenas, equitum decus.^ 

Quanto quisque sibi plura negaverit, 
Ab dis plura feret. Nil cupientium 
Nudus castra peto, et transfuga divitum 
Partes linquere gestio, 

Contemptae dominus splendidior rei, 
Quam si, quidquid arat impiger Apulus, 
Occultare meis dicerer horreis, 
Magnas inter opes inops. 

Purae rivus aquae, silvaque jugerum 
Paucorum, et segetis certa fides meae, 
Fulgentem imperio fertilis Afi^icae 
Fallit sorte beatior. 

Quamquam nee Calabras mella ferunt apes, 
Nee Laestrygonia Bacchus in amphora 
Languescit mihi, nee pinguia Gallicis * 

Crescunt vellera pascuis, 

Importuna tamen Pauperies abest ; 
Nee, si plura velim, tu dare deneges. 
Contracto melius parva cupidine 
Vectigalia porrigam, 

Quam si Mygdoniis regnum Alyattei 
Campis continuem. Multa petentibus 
Desunt multa : bene est, cui Deus obtulit 
Parca, quod satis est, manu. 



280 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XVII. 

TO L. ^LIUS LAMIA. 

This personage was the son of the L. M, Lamia who sup- 
ported Cicero in the suppression of the Catiline conspiracy, 
and appears during the civil wars to have espoused the party 
of Caesar. Horace's friend was consul a.d. 3 ; afterwards 
appointed by Tiberius governor of Syria, but not allowed to 
enter on the administration of the province. He became, 

A.D. 

Noble ^lius, whose house hath its rise in that Lamus 
From whom both the first and the later descendants 
(As attesting memorials''^ record) 
The great name of Lamia inherit, ■ 

Thou canst trace back, indeed, to an absolute monarch, 
Holding sway, it is said, over Formia's walled ramparts, 
And the waters of Liris, that flow 
Into grassy domains of Marica. 

To-morrow the east wind shall send us a tempest. 
Which — if true be the crow, that old seer of foul weather — 
Shall strew in the grove many leaves ; 
On the shore,t many profitless sea-weeds. 

While thou canst, then, protect from the rains the dry 

faggots ; 
Spend to-morrow in resting thyself and thy household ; 
Feast thy genius with wine — but not mixed ; 

And do not forget a young porker. 



* " Per memores — fastos." " Family records," not the "fasti con- 
sulares. " — M acleane. 

t The shore of Minturna, on the borders of Latium and Campania, 
where the nymph Marica was worshipped. 



BOOK III. — ODE XVII. 281 

A.D. 32, "Praetectus Urbi," and died the following year. 
Mitscherlich says : " His own good sense will easily show 
any well-bred gentleman (urbanum) that Horace here, in a 
well-bred, gentlemanlike way, offers himself as a guest ; in 
plain words, hints that Lamia should ask him to dine." On 
which the commentator in Orelli observes, with much feel- 
ing asperity : " In the whole poem there is not a vestige of 
this sort of gentlemanlike good-breeding, if gentlemanlike 
good-breeding it be, which it is permitted vehemently to 
doubt." Evidently the commentator is an Italian. A gen- 
tleman of that country would certainly dispute the good- 
breeding of any friend offering to drop in at dinner. 



Carm. XVII. 

^li, vetusto nobilis ab Lamo, 
Quando et priores hinc Lamias ferunt 
Denominatos, et nepotum 

Per memores genus omne fastos ;' 

Auctore ab illo ducis originem, 
Qui Formiarum moenia dicitur 
Princeps et innantem Maricae 
Litoribus tenuisse Lirim,t 

Late tyrannus : eras foliis nemus 
Multis et alga litus inutili 
Demissa tempestas ab Euro 
Stern et, aquce nisi fallit augur 

Annosa comix. Dum potis, aridum 
Compone lignum : eras Genium mero 
Curabis et porco bimestri. 
Cum famulis operum solutis. 



282 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XVIIL 

TO FAUNUS. 

Faunus was not a stationary divinity. He was supposed 
to come in the spring, and depart after the celebration of 
his festival in December. From " parvis alumnis " (trans- 
lated "young weanlings"), we may suppose this ode was 
written in spring. — Macleane. Ritter denies that by 
''parvis alumnis" young animals are meant; and contends 
that the words refer to young plants, transferred from the 
nursery to fields or orchards. Ritter also dissents from 
the general interpretation, which I have followed, that 
" Veneris sodali " is to be coupled with " craterae." Accord- 
ing to him, the companion of Venus is Faunus, the lover of 
the Nymphs, and not the wine-bowl. 

Faunus, thou lover of coy nymphs who fly thee, 
Enter my bounds, and fields that slope to sunlight ; 
Enter them gently ; and depart, propitious 
To my young weanlings. 

If tender kid, when the year rounds, be offered ; 
If to the bowl, Venus's boon companion. 
Fail not libation due !"^ — With ample incense 
Steams thine old altar, 

Loose strays the herd on grassy meads disporting. 
What time December's Nones bring back thy feast-day ; 
Blithe, o'er the fields, streams forth the idling hamlet, 
Freed — with its oxen. 

Fearless the lambs behold the wolf prowl near them ; 
The woodland strews its leaves before thy footstep ; 
And on his hard task-mistress Earth, exulting. 
Thrice stamps the delver !t 



* "Si tener pleno cadit hsedus anno, 
Larga nee desunt Veneris sodali 
Vina craterae, Vetus ara niulto 
Fumat odore," &c. 
As I have here adopted a novelty in the punctuation, suggested by Mac- 



BOOK III. — ODE XVIII. 283 

Carm. XVIII. 

Faune, Nymphamm fugientum amator, 
Per meos fines et aprica rura 
Lenis incedas abeasque parvis 
^quus alumnis ; 

Si tener pleno cadit haedus anno, 
Larga nee desunt Veneris sodali 
Vina craterae. Vetus ara multo 

Fumat odore,'^ 
Ludit herboso pecus omne campo, 
Cum tibi Nonae redeunt Decembres ; 
Festus in pratis vacat otioso 

Cum bove pagus ; 
Inter audaces lupus errat agnos ; 
Spargit agrestes tibi silva frondes ; 
Gaudet invisam pepulisse fossor 

Ter pede terram.t 

leane, it is well to subjoin his reasons for the innovation, "I have not 
followed the usual punctuation, which makes 'fumat' depend upon *si,' 
with a comma at ' craterse,' and a period at 'odore.' Horace claims the 
protection of Faunus for his lambs in the spring on the ground of his 
due observance of the rights of December, which he then goes on to 
describe. ' Pleno anno ' means at the end of the year when the Faunalia 
took place." Therefore the division in the poem at which, after the in- 
vitation to Faunus in the spring, Horace passes on to describe the festi- 
val in the winter, is more intelligible, and far less abrupt, by commencing 
it with the sacrifice on the altar. 

+ ' ' Gaudet invisam pepulisse fossor 
Ter pede terram." 
"'Fossor' is put generally, I imagine, for a labouring husbandman, 
who may be supposed to have no love for the earth that he digs for 
another." — Macleane. This triple stamp is a dancing measure, which 
is likened to the anapaest, where two feet are short and one long. Mac- 
leane quotes Sir John Davies's poem (Orchesti'a) in explanation of this 
measure — 

"And still their feet an anapaest do sound," &c. 

But it is perhaps best understood by any one who happens to have 
learned, in the old-fashioned hornpipe, that step familiarly called "toe, 
heel, and cloe," — touching the ground lightly with the toe, next with 
the heel, and then bringing down the whole sole of the foot with a stamp. 
I have seen that step, or something very like it, performed in a village 
dance in the south of Italy. 



284 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIX. 

TO TELEPHUS. IN HONOUR OF MURENA'S INSTALLATION 

IN THE COLLEGE OF AUGURS. 

A. Terentius Varro Murena, adopted by A. Terentius 
Varro, whose name he took, according to custom, subdued 
the Salassi, an Alpine tribe, and divided their territory 
among Praetorian soldiers, who founded the town of 
Augusta, now Aosta. He was named Consul Suffectus for 

B.C. 

You tell us how long after Inachus flourished 
King Codrus, who feared not to die for his country ; 
What noble descendants from ^acus sprung. 
What battles were fought under Ilion the sacred ; 

But you say not a word upon things more important — 
What price one must pay for a cask of old Chian ? 

Baths,'^ rooms — where and whose ? What the moment 
to thaw 
These frost-bitten limbs in the sunshine of supper ? 

Ho, boy, there, a cup ! t Brim it full for the New Moon ! 
Ho, boy, there, a cup ! Brim it full for the Midnight ! 
Ho, boy, there, a cup ! Brim it full — to the health 
Of him we would honour ! — Murena the Augur. 

Proportioned the bowls are to three or nine measures, 
As each man likes best ; J the true poet will ever 
Suit his to the odd-numbered Muses, and quaff 

Thrice three in the rapture the Nine give to brimmers. 

* "Quis aquam temperet ignibus." Orelli considers this refers to 
the water to be warmed for the baths ; Ritter, to the water to be warmed 
for admixture with wine. I have adopted the former interpretation, 
though I think it doubtful. 

+ "Here,, in a kind of phantasy, the poet transports himself with 
Telephus into the midst of the entertainment." — Orelli. 
X ** Tribus aut novem 
Miscentur cyathis pocula commodis." 
"The ' cyathus' was a ladle with which the drink was passed from the 



BOOK III. — ODE XIX. 285 

B.C. 23. In B.C. 22 he was involved in the conspiracy of 
Fannius Caepio against the Hfe of Augustus, and, though 
his guilt seems doubtful, executed. This is the same per- 
son whom Horace addresses under the name Licinius, 
Book XL Ode x., " Rectius vives Licini," &c. The metre 
in the original is the second Asclepiadean ; but I have 
found it easier to preserve fidelity to the sense and spirit of 
the poem by employing one of the varieties of rhythm which 
I have appropriated to the Alcaic. 

Carm. XIX. 

Quantum distet ab Inacho 

Codrus, pro patria non timidus mori, 

Narras, et genus ^aci, 

Et pugnata sacro bella sub Ilio : 

Quo Chium pretio cadum 

Mercemur, quis aquam temperet ignibus,* 
Quo prsebente domum et quota 

Pelignis caream frigoribus, taces. 

t Da Lunae propere novas, 

Da Noctis mediae, da, puer, auguris 

Murenae : tribus aut novem 

Miscentur cyathis pocula commodis.J 

Qui Musas amat impares, 

Ternos ter cyathos attonitus petet 

Vates ; tres prohibet supra 

Rixarum metuens tangere Gratia, 

mixing-bowl to the drinking-cup. The ladle was of certain capacity, 
and twelve 'cyathi' went to the Sextarius. Horace says, in effect, 'Let 
the wine be mixed in the proportion of three cyathi of wine to nine of 
water, or of nine of wine to three of water.' . . . ' Commodis,' 'fit 
and proper,' — ' cyathi,' that is, 'bumpers,' " — Macleane. The above 
seems the best and most intelligible interpretation of a passage in which, 
if conjectures were cyathi, the commentators would have greatly ex- 
ceeded the number allowed to the nine Muses. 



286 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

But the Grace, with her twin naked sisters, shuns quarrel. 
And to more than three measures refuses her sanction. 
Ho ! ho ! what a joy to go mad for a time ! 

Why on earth stops the breath of that fife Berecyn- 
thian ? 

And why is that harp so unsocially silent, 
And the lively Pandean pipe idly suspended ? 

Quick, roses — and more ! Let it rain with the rose ! 
There is nothing I hate like the hand of a niggard. 

Let the noise of our mirth split the ears of old Lycus. 
He is envious — our riot shall gorge him with envy. 
The ears of our neighbour, his wife, let it reach. 

No wife could suit less the grey hairs of old Lycus.* 



Thee, O Telephus, radiant with locks of thick cluster, 
Thee, with face like the star of the eve at its clearest, 
Budded Rhode is courting ; I too am on fire. 

But me Glycera keeps in the flames burning slowly.t 



* The graduated process of a drinking-bout is most naturally simulated 
in these verses. First stage, the amiable expansion of heart in the 
friendly toast — the toleration of differing tastes ; — each man may drink 
as much as he likes. Secondly, the consciousness of getting drunk, and 
thinking it a fine thing ; — joy to go mad. Thirdly, the craving for 
noise ; — let the band strike up. Fourthly, a desire for something cool ; 
— roses in ancient Rome — soda-water in modern England. Fifthly, 
the combative stage ; — aggressive insult to poor old Lycus. Sixthly, 
the maudlin stage, soft and tender ; — complimentar}'^ to Telephus, and 
confidingly pathetic as to his own less fortunate love-affairs. 

+ Commentators have endeavoured to create a pvizzle even here, 
where the meaning appears very obvious. Rhode runs after you (petit), 
who are so handsome — Glycera does not run after me, but keeps me 
languishing ; the sense is consistent with the tone, half envious, half 
sarcastic, with which the poet always speaks of Telephus, the typical 
beauty-man and lady-killer. 



BOOK III. — ODE XIX. 287 

Nudis juncta sororibus. 

Insanire juvat : cur Berecyntiae 
Cessant flamina tibiae ? 

Cur pendet tacita fistula cum lyra ? 

Parcentes ego dexteras 

Odi : sparge rosas ; audiat invidus 
Dementem strepitum Lycus 

Et vicina seni non habilis Lyco/^ 

Spissa te nitidum coma, 

Puro te similem, Telephe, Vespero, 
Tempestiva petit Rhode : 

Me lentus Glycerae torret amor mese.t 



ODE XX.— Omitted. 



288 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXI. 

TO MY CASK. 

This poem appears composed in honour of some occasion 
in which Horace entertained the famous L. Valerius Mes- 
sala Corvinus. No man in that great age was more re- 
markable for the variety of his accomplishments than this 
Corvinus. Sprung from one of the greatest consular fami- 
lies, he espoused the senatorian party in the civil wars, and 
attached himself especially to Cassius. He held the third 
place in the command of the Republican army, and at 

Philippi 
Coeval with me, born when Manlius was consul, 
Whatsoe'er the effects of thy life, while in action — 
Spleen or mirth, angry brawl or wild love, 
Or, O gentle cask,'"^ ready slumber — 

Under what head soe'er there be entered account oft 
The grapes thou hast kept since in Massicus gathered. 
Thou art worth being roused on a day 
Of good fortune; descend J for Corvinus 

Asking wines by age mellowed ! He will not neglect thee, 
All imbued though he be with Socratical maxims. 
Father Cato, full often, 'tis said, 

Warmed his virtue with wine undiluted. § 

Thou givest a soft-pricking spur to the sluggish, 
Makest gentle the harsh, and confiding the cautious. 

* " Pia testa." The exact meaning of " pia" here has given rioe to 
much critical disputation. Macleane says he knows no better transla- 
tion than Francis's "gentle cask," for the meaning is to be derived 
from its connection with "facilem somnum." Yonge adopts the same 
interpretation, "gentle, kindly," — observing "it would be 'impia' if 
producing 'querelas, rixas,'" &c. I have translated "testa" cask, as 
a word familiar to the English reader, but it here properly means the 
amphora, a vessel into which the wine was, as we should say, bottled. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXL 289 

Philippi turned Augustus's flank, stormed his camp, and 
nearly took him prisoner. Subsequently he made terms 
with Antony, whom he left for Augustus, after Antony's 
league with Cleopatra — and at Actium commanded the 
centre of the fleet with great distinction. Besides his 
eminence as a commander and a statesman, he was con- 
spicuous as an orator, a wit, a historian, and a grammarian. 
He also wrote poetry. — See Smith's Dictionary for fuller 
details of his life, art. "Messala." 

Carm. XXI. 

O nata mecum consule Manlio, 
Seu tu querelas, sive geris jocos 
Seu rixam et insanos amores, 
Seu facilem, pia testa,* somnum, 

Quocunque lectum nomine t Massicum 
Servas, moveri digna bono die, 
Descende,f Corvino jubente 
Promere languidiora vina. 

Non ille, quamquam Socraticis madet 
Sermonibus, te negleget horridus : 
Narratur et prisci Catonis 
Scepe mero§ caluisse virtus. 

Tu lene tormentum ingenio admoves 
Plerumque duro ; tu sapientium 

t " Quocunque nomine," " on whatever account." On the technical 
meaning of " nomen," signifying "an entry in an account," see Mr 
Long's note on Cicero in Verr. 11, i, 38. "'Lectum,' which For- 
cellini interprets 'selected,' rather applies to the gathering of the grape 
from which the wine was made. Massic wine was from Mons Massicus 
in Campania." — Macleane. 

t "Descend" — i.e., descend from the place where it was kept (apo- 
theca), in the upper part of the house. 

§ Undiluted— "mere." 

T 



290 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Chasing care from the brows of the wise, 
Thou unlockest their hearts to Lyaeus.* 

Hope and nerve thou restorest to minds worn and harassed, 
Add'st the horn that exalts to the front of the beggar ; 
Fresh from thee he could face down a king, 
Fresh from thee, brave the charge of an army. 

Thee, shall Liber and Venus, if Venus come merry, 
And the Graces, reluctant their bond to dissever. 
And the living lights gaily prolong, 

Till the stars fly from Phoebus returning. 



* '* Retegis Lyseo." "The dative case, 'to' Lyaeus, appears here to 
be employed rather than the ablative." — Orelli. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXI. ^ 291 

Curas et arcanum jocoso 
Consilium retegis Lyaeo ;'^ 

Tu spem reducis mentibus anxiis, 1 

Viresque et addis cornua pauperi, ^ 

Post te neque iratos trementi | 

Regum apices, neque militum arma. i 

Te Liber et, si laeta aderit, Venus, \ 

Segnesque nodum solvere Gratiae, j 

Vivseque producent lucemse, i 

Dum rediens fugat astra Phoebus. ! 



292 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XXII. 

VOTIVE INSCRIPTION TO DIANA. 

Nothing more need be said of this ode than that it is one 
of the votive inscriptions common among the ancients, and 
that a pine-tree would be very fittingly dedicated to Diana. 
The attempts made to extract a story out of the occasion 
and the offering are preposterous. That which is chiefly 
noticeable in this and other poems by Horace, more or less 
similar, is the rare and admirable merit of terseness. The 
poet has sufficient reliance on himself to be sure that, how- 
ever briefly and simply he expresses himself on a subject to 
which brevity and simplicity belong, his unmistakable mark 
will appear on the work. 

Guardian of mountain-peaks, and forests — Virgin, 
Goddess triformed — who, thrice invoked, benignly 
Dost hear young mothers in their hour of travail, 
And from death save them ; 

Thine be this pine which overhangs my villa, 
To which each closing year shall be devoted 
A youthful boar, of sidelong thrusts indulging 
Vain meditations. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXII. 293 



Carm. XXII. 



Montium custos nemommque, Virgo, 
Quae laborantes utero puellas 
Ter vocata audis, adimisque leto, 
Diva triformis : 

Imminens villae tua pinus esto, 
Quam per exactos ego lastus annos 
Verris obliquum meditantis ictum 
Sanguine donem. 



294 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXIII. 

TO PHIDYLE. 

Jani and other commentators have supposed the Phidyle 
here addressed to be Horace's country housekeeper, and 
that Horace in this ode answers some complaint of hers 
that her master did not permit her to sacrifice in a manner 
sufficiently handsome. Orelli observes that Phidyle could 

not 

If with each new-born moon thou lift to Heaven thy suppli- 
ant hands, 
If with some grains of frankincense, fresh corn, and flesh of 
swine. 
My rustic Phidyle, thy rites 
Appease thy simple Lares, 

Thy fruitful vines shall neither feel the south wind's poisoned 

breath,"^ 
Nor mildew blight to sterile dearth thy harvests in the ear, 
Nor appled autumn's sicklied airs 
Infect thy tender weanlings. 

Let victims whose devoted blood shall tinge the Pontiff's 

axe 
Pasture on snow-clad Algidus, mid oak and ilex groves, 
Or, fattening fast on Alban meads. 
Grow ripe for pompous slaughter : t 

But not from thee thy homely gods ask hecatombs of sheep ; 
Content are they with what thou giv'st — content with rural 
crowns ; 

* *' Pestilentem Africum," the sirocco. — Orelli. 
t The flocks and herds that belonged to the College of Pontiffs were 
fed on Algidus and the meadows of Alba Longa. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXIII. 295 

not be Horace's servant, for she is represented as sacrificing 
according to her own choice and will. But this no servant 
could do : the act of sacrifice for the whole family belonged 
exclusively to the head of the establishment. The ode, if 
addressed to any individual at all — which it probably was 
not — would have been addressed, therefore, to some mistress 
of a plain country household. 



Carm. XXIII. 

Caelo supinas si tuleris manus 
Nascente Luna, rustica Phidyle, 
Si thure placaris et horna 
Fruge Lares, avidaque porca, 

Nee pestilentem sentiet Africum '^ 
Fecunda vitis, nee sterilem seges 
Robiginem, aut dulces alumni 
Pomifero grave tempus anno. 

Nam, quae nivali pascitur Algido 
Devota quercus inter et ilices, 
Aut crescit Albanis in herbis,t 
Victima pontificum secures 

Cervice tinget : te nihil attinet 
Tentare multa casde bidentium 



296 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

So twine thy humble rosemary wreath, 
And weave thy fragile myrtle. 

The costliest offering softens not the household gods, if 

wroth, 
More surely than a votive cake or grains of crackling salt, 
Provided that no sin pollute 

The hands which touch the altar. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXIII. 297 I 

Parvos coronantem marino | 

Rore deos fragilique myrto. I 

'i 

Immunis aram si tetigit manus, i 

Non sumptuosa blandior hostia 

Mollivit aversos Penates [ 

Farre pio et saliente mica. . , 



298 THE ODES OF HORAC] 



ODE XXIV. 

ON THE MONEY-SEEKING TENDENCIES OF THE AGE, 

This ode, like those with which Book III. commences, 
appears written with a design to assist Augustus in the 
task of social reform after the conclusion of the civil 
wars. Orelli ascribes the date to a.u.c. 725, 726, Macleane 

to 
Though, as the lord of treasures which outshine 

The unrified wealth of Araby and Indus, 
The piles on which reposed thy palaces, 

Filled up both oceans, Tuscan and Apulic ; * 

Yet if dire Fate her nails of adamant 

Into thy loftiest roof-tree once hath driven,+ 

Thou shalt not banish terror from thy soul, 
Nor from the snares of death thy head deliver. 

Happier the Scythians, wont o'er townless wilds 
To shift the wains that are their nomad dwellings ; 

Or the rude Get^ whose unmeted soil 

Yields its free sheaves and fruits to all in common ; + 

There each man toils but for his single year — 
Rests, and another takes his turn of labour ; 

There ev'n the step-dame, mild and harmless, gives . 
To orphans motherless again the mother. 

* In reference to the custom of building palaces out into the sea. 
+ Si figit adamantinos 

Summis verticibus dira Necessitas 
Clavos." 
Various attempts have been made to explain the obscurity of this meta- 
phor. I have adopted Orelli's interpretation, which he considers to be 
decidedly proved the right one by an Etruscan painting — viz., that while 
the rich man is busied in casting out the moles and raising the height of 
his palace, Destiny is seen driving her nails into the top of the building, 
as if saying to the master, "Hitherto, but no farther ; the fated end is 



BOOK III. — ODE XXIV. 299 

to 728. It is more purely didactic than the first five odes 
of this book — that is to say, it has less of the genuine 
lyrical mode of treating moral subjects. If in that respect 
inferior to those odes — as regards the higher range of 
poetry in the abstract — it is inferior to no ode in elevation 
of sentiment. 

Carm. XXIV. 

Intactis opulentior 

Thesauris Arabum et divitis Indise, 
Caementis licet occupes 

Tyrrhenum omne tuis et mare Apulicum,'' 

Si figit adamantines 

Summis verticibus dira Necessitas 
ClavoSjt non animum metu, 

Non mortis laqueis expedies caput. 

Campestres melius Scythae, 

Quorum plaustra vagas rite trahunt domos, 
Vivunt, et rigidi Getae, 

Immetata quibus jugera fiberasj 

Fruges et Cererem ferunt, 

Nee cultura placet longior annua ; 

Defunctumque laboribus 

^quali recreat sorte vicarius. 

come to thyself." Maclean e, however, prefers the interpretation of a 
commentator in Cruquius, who takes "verticibus" for the human head, 
the most fatal place for a blow. There is no disputing about tastes ; 
but I confess I like this interpretation less than any. Whatever Fate is 
about to do with her adamantine nails, it seems necessary, for connection 
with the preceding lines, that she should fix her mark on the ambitious 
piles which the man is building — not on himself. And if she has driven 
her nails into his head, she might spare for that head the net or snare 
to which the poet refers in the line that follows. 

X The habits of the Suevi, as described by Coesar, Bell. Gall. IV. i., 
are here imputed, correctly or not, to the GetK. 



300 THE ODES OF HORACE. i 

No dowered she-despot rules her lord, nor trusts 

The wife's protection to the leman's splendour.* ] 

There, is the dower indeed magnificent ! 

Ancestral virtue, chastity unbroken, v 

Shrinking with terror from all love save one ; " 

Or death the only sentence for dishonour. \ 

Oh, whosoever would banish out of Rome j 

Intestine rage and fratricidal slaughter, j 

If he would have on reverent statues graved 

This holy title, " Father of his Country," \ 

Let him be bold enough to strike at vice. 

Curb what is now indomitable — Licence, , 

And earn the praise of offer time ! Alas ! 

Virtue we hate while seen alive ; when vanished, I 

We seek her — but invidiously ; and right 

The virtue dead to wrong some virtue living. 

But what avails the verbiage of complaint — 

To rail at guilt, yet punish not the guilty ? ; 

What without morals profit empty laws ? 

If nor that zone, which, as his own enclosure, 

The Sun belts round with fires — nor that whose soil i 
Is ice, the hard land bordering upon Boreas — 

Scare back the avarice of insatiate trade, , 

And oceans are the conquests of the sailor ; i 

If dread to encounter the supreme reproach ' 

Of poverty, ordains to do and suffer ' 

All things for profit, and desert as bare 

The difficult way that only mounts to virtue ? i 



* "Nee nitido fidit adultero." Macleane follows Orelli in consider- 
ing that this means that she does not trust to the influence of the adulterer 
to protect her from the anger of the husband. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXIV. 301 

lUic matre carentibus 

Privignis mulier temperat innocens ; 
Nee dotata regit vimm 

Conjux, nee nitido fidit adultero."' 

Dos est magna parentium 

Virtus, et metuens alterius viri 
Certo foedere eastitas ; 

Et peceare nefas, aut pretium est mori. 

O quisquis volet impias 

Caedes et rabiem tollere civicam, 
Si quaeret Pater urbium 

Subseribi statuis, indomitam audeat 

Refrenare licentiam, 

Clarus postgenitis ; quatenus, heu nefas ! 
Virtutem ineolumem odimus, 

Sublatam ex oeulis quserimus invidi. 

Quid tristes querimoniae, 

Si non supplicio culpa reeiditur ? 
Quid leges sine moribus 

Vanae proficiunt, si neque fervidis 

Pars inclusa ealoribus 

Mundi, nee Boreae finitimum latus, 
Durataeque solo nives, 

Mereatorem abigunt, horrida callidi 

Vineunt aequora navitas ? 

Magnum pauperies opprobrium jubet 
Quidvis et faeere et pati 

Virtutisque viam deserit arduae 



302 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

O were we penitent, indeed, for sins,*" 

How we should haste to cast gems, gauds, gold, useless 
Save as the raw material of all ill, 

Amid the shouts of multitudes applauding, 

Into the vaults of Capitolian Jove ; 

Or that safe treasure-house — the nearest ocean ! 
To weed out avarice dig down to the root. 

And minds relaxed rebrace by rougher training. 

Look at yon high-born boy — he cannot ride ! 

Horseback too rude for him — the chase too dangerous ! 
Skilful and brave — to trundle a Greek hoop ; 

And break the laws which interdict the dice-box :t 

While his mean father with a perjured oath 
Swindles alike his partner and his hearth-guest. 

Spurred by one passion — how to scrape the pelf — 
His worthless self bequeaths an heir as worthless. 

The immoderate J riches grow, forsooth, and grow. 
But ne'er in growing can attain completion -, 

An unknown something, ever absent still. 
Stints into want the unsufficing fortune. 



* I adopt the punctuation of Dillenburger and Orelli — viz., that 
the full stop is at " bene poenitet." — See note in OrelH to lines 49, 50. 

+ " Graeco trocho." This hoop, made of metal, was guided by a rod 
like our hoops nowadays. It seems to have been used in the thorough- 
fares, and by youths as well as mere children. The laws against gam- 
bling were stringent, and in Cicero's time it was an offence sufficiently 
serious for Cicero to make it a grave charge against M. Antony that he 
had pardoned a man condemned for gambling, as he was himself a 
habitual gambler. Juvenal says that the heir still in his infancy (bullatus) 
learnt the dice from his father. 

X '* Improbse divitise." " Improbse " has not here the sense of " dis- 
honest" or *' iniquitous," as it is commonly translated j it means, rather, 



BOOK III. — ODE XXIV. 303 

Vel nos in Capitolium, 

Quo clamor vocat et turba faventium, 
Vel nos in mare proximum 

Gemmas et lapides, aurum et inutile, 

Summi materiem mali, 

Mittamus, scelerum si bene poenitet."^ 
Eradenda cupidinis 

Pravi sunt elementa, et tenerae nimis 

Mentes asperioribus 

Formandae studiis. Nescit equo rudis 
Haerere ingenuus puer, 

Venarique timet ; ludere doctior, 

Seu Gr^co jubeas trocho f 

Seu malis vetita legibus alea : 
Cum perjura patris fides 

Consortem socium fallat et hospitem, 

Indignoque pecuniam 

Heredi properet. Scilicet improbae 
Crescunt divitiae ; X tamen 

Curtae nescio quid semper abest rei. 



"immoderate," "out of all proportion." Macleane rightly obsen-es 
that "improbus" is one of the most difficult words to which to assign 
its proper meaning. It imphes excess, and that excess must be expressed 
according to the subject described. 



304 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXV. 

HYMN TO BACCHUS. 

Of this ode Orelli says, that it belongs more properly than 
any other ode of Horace to the dithyrambic genus, any 
closer imitation of which was denied to the language and 
taste of the Romans, as savouring of affectation or bombast. 
J^owhere in Horace is there more of the true lyrical enthu- 
siasm : 
Whither, full of thee, O Bacchus, 

Am I hurried by thy rapture, with a spirit strange possessed? 
Through what forests, through what caverns ? 

Underneath what haunted grottoes shall my voice be heard 
aloud, 

Pondering words to lift up C^sar 

To his rank 'mid starry orders, in the council-halls of Jove ? 
O for utterance largely sounding. 

Never yet through mouth of poet made the language of 
the world ! 

As the slumberless Bacchante 

From the lonely mountain-ridges, stricken still with won- 
der, sees 
Flash the waves of wintry Hebrus, 

Sparkle snows in Thracian lowlands, soar barbarian Rho- 
dope, 

Such my rapture, wandering guideless,*' 

Now where river-margents open, now where forest-sha- 
dows close. 

* " Ut mihi devio 
Ripas et vacuum nemus 
Mirari libet." 
Some of the MSS. have "rupes" instead of " ripas," and that reading 



BOOK III. — ODE XXV. 305 

siasm : the picture of the Bacchante, astonished by the land- 
scape stretched below her, is singularly beautiful, Dillen- 
burger and Orelli conjecture the poem to have been written 
A.U.C. 725-726; Macleane thinks it may have been on the 
announcement of the taking of Alexandria, a.u.c. 724. It 
was evidently while some new triumph of Caesar's was fresh 
in the mind of the poet and of the public. 



Carm. XXV. 

Quo me, Bacche, rapis tui 

Plenum ? qu^ nemora aut quos agor in specus 
Velox mente nova ? quibus 

Antris egregii Caesaris audiar 

y^ternum meditans decus 

Stellis inserere et consilio Jovis ? 
Dicam insigne, recens, adhuc 

Indictum ore alio. Non secus in jugis 

Exsomnis stupet Evias 

Hebrum prospiciens, et nive candidam 
Thracen, ac pede barbaro 

Lustratam Rhodopen, ut mihi devio 

Ripas et vacuum nemus 

Mirari libet''' O Naiadum potens 



is adopted by Lambinus and Muretus. Dillenburger, Orelli, Macleane, 
and Yonge agree in preferring '* ripas," as having the authority of the best 
MSS. Assuming this latter reading to be right, it renders more appro- 
priate the previous description of the Bacchante's amaze in seeing all the 
landscape expand before her. The poet then comes on the river-bank 
as he emerges from the forest, the country thus opening upon him, and 
again closed in. So in Schiller's 'Der Spaziergang' the poet plunges 

U 



306 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Lord of Naiads, lord of Maenads, 

Who with hands divinely strengthened, from the mountain 
heave the ash : 

Nothing little, nothing lowly, 

Nothing mortal, will I utter ! Oh, how perilously sweet 
'Tis to follow thee, Lenaeus, 

Thee the god who wreathes his temples with the vine-leaf 
for his crown ! 



into the wood, and following a winding path, suddenly the veil is rent. 
The passage is well translated by a lamented friend, Dr Whewell : — 

" Lost is the landscape at once in the dark wood's secret recesses, 
Where a mysterious path leads up the winding ascent ; 

Suddenly rent is the veil ; all startled, I view with amazement. 
Through the wood's opening glade, blazing in splendour the day." 

I cannot help thinking that Horace had in his mind an actual scene, 
as Schiller had in the Walk — that it was in some ramble amidst rocks, 
woods, and water, that the idea of this dithyramb occurred to him. We 
have his own authority for believing that, like most other poets, he com- 
posed a good deal in his rural walks, — " circa nemus uvidique Tiburis 
ripas operosa parvus Carmina fingo." 



BOOK III. — ODE XXV. 307 

Baccharumque valentium 

Proceras manibus vertere fraxinos : 

Nil parvum aiit humili modo, 

Nil mortale loquar, Dulce periciilum est, 
O Lensee, sequi deum 

Cingentem viridi tempora pampino. 



308 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE XXVL 

TO VENUS. 

This ode has been generally supposed to be written when 
Horace had arrived at a time of life sufficiently advanced to 
retire from the service of the ladies, and Malherbe, the 
French poet, had it in his eye when, at the age of fifty, he 
made farewell visits to the fair ones he had courted till then, 

and 
I have lived till of late well approved by the fair. 
And have, not without glory, made war in their cause ; 
Now the wall on the left side of Venus"" shall guard 
My arms, and the lute which has done with the service. 

Here, here, place the flambeaux which lit the night-march ; 
Here, the bows and the crowbars — -dread weapons of siege,t 
Carrying menace of doom to the insolent gates 

Which refused at my conquering approach to sur- 
render. 

Regal goddess who reignest o'er Cyprus the blest, 
And o'er Memphis, unchilled by the snow-flakes of Thrace, 
Lift on high o'er that arrogant Chloe thy scourge. 
And by one smarting touch fright her into submission. 

* In the temple of Venus, on the left wall, as being most propitious. 
— Macleane. The left side, as the heart side, is now, in many super- 
stitious practices derived from the ancients, considered the best for div- 
inations connected with the affections. In chiromancy, the left hand is 
examined in preference to the right, not only for the line of life, but for 
the lines supposed to prognosticate in affairs of the heart. 

f The torches to light the gallant to the house he went to attack, and 
the crowbar to burst open her door, are intelligible enough. What is 
meant by "arcus," "the bows," is by no means so clear. The weapon 
may be merely symbolical (Cupid's bow and arrows), or it may have 
been the arbalist or cross-bow, and used to frighten the porter. — See 
Orelli's note. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXVI. .309 

and informed them that he resigned his commission in the 
armies of Cytherea. But I think with Macleane that the 
ode represents nothing more than a successful gallant's first 
refusal; and that to apply it to Horace himself, or to assume, 
from the opening, that he was getting into years, and about 
to abandon lyrical poetry, is to mistake the character and 
scope of the ode. 

Carm. XXVI. 

Vixi puelHs nuper idoneus, 
Et militavi non sine gloria ; 

Nunc arma defunctumque bello 
Barbiton hie paries habebit, 

Laevum marinae qui Veneris* latus 
Custodit. Hie, hie ponite lucida 
Funalia, et vectes, et arcus 
Oppositis foribus minaces. t 

O quae beatam, diva, tenes Cyprum, et 
Memphin carentem Sithonia nive, 
Regina, sublimi flagello 

Tange Chloen semel arrogantem. 



3IO THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXVII. 

TO GALATEA UNDERTAKING A JOURNEY. 

We know nothing more of Galatea than the ode tells us, 
by which she appears to have been a friend of Horace's 
meditating a journey to Greece. Upon the strength of a 
line in which he asks her to remember him, an attempt has 
been actually made to include her in the catalogue of Horace's 

mistresses ; 

Let the ill omen of the shrilling screech-owl,* 
Or pregnant bitch, or vixen newly littered, 
Or tawny she-wolf skulked down from Lanuvium t 
Convoy the wicked ; 

Let the snake break off their intended journey. 
If their nags start, when arrow-like he glances 
Slant on the road — I, where I love, a cautious 
Provident Augur, 

Ere the weird crow, reseeking stagnant marshes. 
Predict the rain-storm, will invoke the raven 
From the far East, who, as the priestlier croaker, 
Shall overawe him. % 

* " Parrse recinentis." Macleane observes that it is not determined 
what this bird *'parra" was, or whether it is known in these islands. 
I venture to call it, as other translators have done, the screech-owl, 
which is still, in Italy as elsewhere, deemed a bird of bad omen. Orelli 
treats of the subject in an elaborate note, which, however, decides 
nothing. Yonge says, "I believe it is the owl." — See his note. 

+ "Rava decurrens lupa Lanuvino. " The wolf runs down from the 
wooded hills round Lanuvium, because that town was near the Appia 
Via, leading to Brundusium, where Galatea would embark. — Macleane, 
Orelli. " Rava lupa." What exact colour " rava " means is only so 
far clear that Horace applies it both to a lion and a wolf. Orelli says 



BOOK III. — ODE XXVII. 3II 

mistresses ; whereas the poem, in the digressive introduction 
of the glorious fate which awaited Europa, might much more 
plausibly be supposed to intimate that some lover or spouse 
of very high degree was reserved for Galatea at her journey's 
end. The beautiful picture of Europa's flight and remorse 
is among the instances of Horace's exquisite adaptation of 
the dramatic element to lyrical purposes. 



Carm. XXVII. 

Impios parrae recinentis* omen 
Ducat, et praegnans canis, aut ab agro 
Rava decurrens lupa Lanuvino,t 
Fetaque vulpes : 

Rumpat et serpens iter ins titu turn. 
Si per obliquum similis sagittse 
Terruit mannos : ego cui timebo 
Providus auspex, 

Antequam stantes repetat paludes 
Imbrium divina avis imminentum, 
Oscinem corvum prece suscitabo 
Solis ab ortu. t 



the word is properly applied to the colour of the eye, and is between 
black and tawny, as in many animals. I do not know what animals he 
means, but the eye of most wild beasts is a deep orange colour or a slaty 
blue. 

+ The crow flying back to his pool or marsh indicated bad weather. 
The raven croaking from the east was an omen of good weather, there- 
fore the poet summons the raven in time to forestall the crow. He calls 
the raven " oscinem corvum." The epithet is technically augural. " Os- 
cines aves " were birds which the augurs consulted for their note, as they 
consulted the birds called "prsepetes" for their flight. Perhaps the 
epithet justifies the slight paraphrase in the last two lines of the stanza 
in translation. 



312 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Go where thou mayst, be happy ; and remember 
Me, Galatea ! May no chough's dark shadow 
Lose thee a sunbeam, nor one green woodpecker 
Dare to tap leftward.* 

But see where quick and quivering with the tempest 
Glares sloped Orion. I have known the breakers 
In Hadria's gulf; and with what fawning smoothness 
Sins the pale west wind. 

To feel the blind tumultuous shock of Auster, 
The howl of dark seas lashing shores that tremble — 
This we wish only to the wives and children 
Of our worst foemen. 

Europa, thus to the fair bull deceiving 
Trusted her snowy form ; thus, ensnared in 
The widths of ocean, eyeing its dread monsters. 
Paled from her courage : 

She who so lately in the tranquil meadows 
Culled wild flowers due as coronals to wood-nymphs, 
Now beheld only through night's darkling glimmer 
Stars and wild waters. 

Once reaching Crete, Isle of the Hundred Cities, 
" Father," she cried, o'ercome with shame and sorrow, 
"A daughter's name, alas, a daughter's duty 
I have abandoned ! 



* "Picus," a woodpecker or heighhould. — Orelli. "The green 
woodpecker." — Yonge. A vast deal of erudition has been lavished 
upon the question, why the word "laevus," or "leftward," should sig- 
nify ill luck as applied to the "picus," when the left was considered 
lucky by the Romans, though unlucky by the Greeks. It is suggested 
that the comparison may have arisen from the different practice of the 



BOOK III. — ODE XXVII. 3I3 

Sis licet felix, ubicunque mavis, 
Et memor nostri, Galatea, vivas : 
Teque nee laevus vetet ire pious, * 
Nee vaga comix. 

Sed vides, quanto trepidet tumultu 
Pronus Orion. Ego quid sit ater 
Hadriae, novi, sinus et quid albus 
Peccet lapyx. 

Hostium uxores puerique csecos 
Sentiant motus orientis Austri, et 
^quoris nigri fremitum, et trementes 
Verbere ripas. 

Sic et Europe niveum doloso 
Credidit tauro latus, et scatentem 
Beluis pontum mediasque fraudes 
Palluit audax. 

Nuper in pratis studiosa florum, et 
Debitae Nymphis opifex coronae, 
Nocte sublustri nihil astra praeter 
Vidit et undas. 

Quae simul centum tetigit potentem 
Oppidis Creten : ' Pater, O relictum 
Filiae nomen pietasque,' dixit, 
Victa furore ! 



Greeks and Romans in taking note of birds — the former facing the 
north, the latter the south (see Orelli and Macleane). I believe, how- 
ever, that it vi^as the tap of the vi^ood pecker, and not his flight, that was 
unlucky. It is so considered still in Italy, and corresponds to our super- 
stitious fear of the beetle called the death-watch. If, therefore, heard on 
the left or heart side, it directly menaced life. 



314 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

''What have I done? what left?"^ The crimes of virgins 
A single death does not suffice to punish. 
Am I awake ? have I in truth committed 
Sin, and so vilely? 

" Or am I guiltless — duped by a vain phantom 
Leading a dream out of the ivory portal ? 
Could I indeed have left for watery deserts 
Home and the field-flowers ? 

" O that the bull were to my wrath delivered ! 
O for a sword to hack his horns, and mangle 
The monster now so hated, though so lately — 
Woe is me ! — worshipped. 

" Shameless, my household gods I have forsaken, 
Shameless, I loiter on the road to Orcus ! 
Would to the gods that I were in the desert 
Strayed among lions ! 

" While in these cheeks the bloom be yet unwithered, 
And all the sap of the luxuriant life-blood 
Make their prey tempting, may this fatal beauty 
Feast the fierce tigers. 

" I hear my absent father, ' Vile Europa 
Why pause to die ? More ways than one, O coward ! 
Here, at this elm-tree, strangled by thy girdle, 
Sole friend not cast off; 

" ' Or there, down yonder precipice, plunge headlong 
Whirled by the storm-blast to thy grave in ocean ; 
Unless, O royal-bom, it please thee better, 
Sold into bondage, 



* ' ' Unde quo veni. " " * Unde ' implies not that she was so distracted 
that she had forgotten from whence she had come, but what an exchange 
I have made. " — Macleane. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXVII. 315 

' Unde quo veni ? * Levis una mors est 
Virginum culpae. Vigilansne ploro 
Turpe commissum, an vitiis carentem 
Ludit imago 

Vana, quae porta fugiens eburna 
Somnium ducit ? Meliusne fluctus 
Ire per longos fait, an recentes 
Carpere flores ? 

Si quis infamem mihi nunc juvencum 
Dedat iratae, lacerare ferro et 
Frangere enitar modo multum amati 
Cornua monstri. 

Impudens liqui patrios Penates ; 
Impudens Orcum moror. O deomm 
Si quis haec audis, utinam inter errem 
Nuda leones ! 

Antequam turpis macies decentes 
Occupet malas, teneraeque succus 
Defluat praedae, speciosa quaero 
Pascere tigres. 

*' Vilis Europe," pater urget absens : 
" Quid mori cessas? Potes hac ab omo 
Pendulum zona bene te secuta 
Laedere collum. 

Sive te rupes et acuta leto 
Saxa delectant, age te procelLx' 
Crede veloci, nisi herile mavis 
Carpere pensum, 



3l6 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

" ' To card the wool of some barbarian mistress, 
And share with her the base love of a savage.' " 
While thus she raved despairing, Venus softly 
Neared her, arch-smiling, 

With the boy-archer — but his bow was loosened ; 
And sating first her mirth, thus spoke the goddess : 
" Thou wilt not scold when this loathed bull returning, 
Yields to thy mercy. 

"Know thyself bride of Jove the all-subduing. 
Hush sobs ; learn well to bear thy glorious fortune ; 
Thou on one section of the globe '^ bestowest 
Name everlasting." 



* " Sectus orbis" literally means "half the world," as the ancients 
divided our planet only into the two great divisions, Europe and Asia. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXVII. 317 

Regius sanguis, dominaeque tradi 
Barbarae pellex." Aderat querenti 
Perfidum ridens Venus, et remisso 
Filius arcu. 

Mox, ubi lusit satis : ' Abstineto, 
Dixit, ' irarum calidseque rixas. 
Cum tibi invisus laceranda reddet 
Cornua taurus. 

Uxor invicti Jovis esse nescis : 
Mitte singultus, bene ferre magnam 
Disce fortunamj tua sectus orbis^ 
Nomina ducet.' 



3l8 THE ODES OF HORACE. , 

i 

ODE XXVIII. 

ON THE FEAST-DAY OF NEPTUNE. I 

It is but a waste of ingenious trifling to conjecture who or ; 
what Lyde was, or, indeed, if any Lyde whatever existed 
elsewhere than in the poet's fancy. The poem is very lively i 
and graceful, and evidently intended for general popularity i 
as a song, without any personal application to the writer. ; 

What, on the feast-day of Neptune, j 

Can I do better ? Up, Lyde ! Out from its hiding-place, 
quick, 
Drag forth the Caecuban hoarded ; 

Make an attack upon Wisdom 1 On to the siege of her \ 
fort ! j 

j 

See how the noon is declining, I 

Yet, as if day were at stand-still, laggard, thou leav'st in \ 

the store ^ 

The cask which has lazily slumbered j 

Since Bibulus acted as consul ; now is its time to awake, j 

Sing we, by turns, of King Neptune, j 

And the green locks of the Nereids ; then to thy bow- | 
shapen lyre 

Chant us a hymn to Latona, i 

And to the swift-footed Dian, and to her arrows of light ; ] 

Then, as the crown of thy verses, ' 

Chant to the goddess who visits, borne on her car by the ; 

swans, 

Cyclades, Cnidos, and Paphos ; i 

Night, too, shall have her deserts, and lullabies rock her ; 

to sleep.* 



BOOK III.— ODE XXVIII. 319 



Carm. XXVIII. 

Festo quid potius die ^ 

Neptuni faciam ? Prorae reconditum, ! 

Lyde strenua, Csecubum, 1 

Munitseque adhibe vim sapientiae. • 

.,j 

Inclinare meridiem j 

Sentis ; ac, veluti stet volucris dies, j 

Parcis deripere horreo ; 

Cessantem Bibuli Consulis amphoram. ■ 

Nos cantabimus invicem ' 

Neptunum, et virides Nereidum comas ; j 

Tu curva recines lyra I 
Latonam, et celeris spicula Cynthise : 

1 

Summo carmine, quae Cnidon \ 

Fulgentesque tenet Cycladas et Paphon 

Junctis visit oloribus ; | 

Dicetur merita Nox quoque nenia.''*' ^ 



* " Dicetur merita Nox quoque nenia." The word "nenia" is ap- 
plied to funereal dirges, and also, as Dillenburger observes, to the songs 
by which nurses rocked infants to sleep ; and Orelli and Macleane sug- 
gest that such is the meaning of the word here. 



320 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XXIX. 

INVITATION TO MiECENAS. 

No ode of Horace specially addressed to Maecenas ex- 
ceeds this in dignity of sentiment and sustained beauty of 
treatment. Horace's descriptions of summer are always 
charming, and though he rejects the prosaic minuteness by 
which modern poets, when describing external nature, make 
an inventory of scenic details as tediously careful as if they 
were cataloguing articles for auction, he succeeds in bring- 
ing a complete picture before the eye, and elevates the sub- 
ject of still life by the grace of the figures he places, whether 
in the fore or the back ground. But he has seldom sur- 
passed the beautiful image of summer in its sultry glow and 

in 

Long since, Maecenas sprung from Tuscan kings, 
A vintage mellowing in its virgin cask, 
Balms to anoint the hair. 

And roses meet for wreaths on honoured brows. 

Wait at my home for thee. Snatch leisure brief, 
And turn thy gaze from Tibur's waterfalls''^ 
The slopes of ^sula,t 

And parricidal Telegon's blue hills ; 

Desert fastidious wealth, and that proud pile 
Soaring aloft, the neighbour of the clouds ; % 
Cease to admire the smoke. 

The riches, and the roar of prosperous Rome. 



* " Ne semper iidum Tibur." I interpret " udum" as referring to 
the cascades of Anio ; it may mean tlie rills meandering through the 
orchards of Tibur. 

t Munro has ^fulae. " The /is found in some of the best MSS. of 
Horace, in the best of the scholiasts, as well as of Livy, as shown by 



BOOK III. — ODE XXIX. 32 1 

in its languid repose which adorns this ode, in contrast with 
the statesman, intent on pubHc cares, and gazing on Rome 
and the hills beyond from his lofty tower. It is unneces- 
sary to point out the nobleness of the comparison between 
the course of the river and the mutability of human affairs, 
or the simple grandeur of the lines on Fortune so finely, 
though so loosely, paraphrased by Dryden; and so applica- 
ble to public men that it has furnished with illustrations 
appropriate to themselves some of the greatest of English 
statesmen. 



Carm. XXIX. 

Tyrrhena regum progenies, tibi 
Non ante verso lene merum cado, 
Cum flore, Maecenas, rosarum, et 
Pressa tuis balanus capillis 

Jamdudum apud me est. Eripe te morae 
Ne semper udum Tibur,* et ^sulae t 
Declive contempleris arvum, et 
Telegoni juga parricidae. 

Fastidiosam desere copiam et 
Molem propinquam nubibus arduis ; % 
Omitte mirari beatae 

Fumum et opes strepitumque Romse. 



Huebner in the Hermes, i. p. 426, who completes the proof by citing 
three inscriptions, one of them Greek, in which the gentile names, 
Aefolanus, Aefulanus, Al(pov\av6s, occur." — Munro's Horace, Introcl. 
xxviii. 

t The lofty tower or belvidere of the palace built by Maecenas on the 
Esquiline Hill, whence Nero looked down on the conflagration of Rome. 

X 



322 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Sweet to the wealthy the reHef of change ; 
Nor needs it tapestried woof nor Tyrian pall 
For simple feast, whose mirth 

In humble roofs unknits the brows of Care. 

Now, hidden long, Andromeda's bright sire 
Glares forth revealed : now rages Procyon, 
And the mad Lion-star,'"" 

As Sol brings back the sultry days of drought 

Now doth the shepherd, with his languid flock, 
Seek streams and shades, and thickets dense, the lair 
Of the rough Forest-God ; 
And silent margins miss the wandering winds. 

All rest save thou, intent on cares of state 
And fears lest aught against thy Rome be planned 
In farthest east, or realm 

Of Persian Cyrus, or by factious Don. 

The issues of the Future a wise God 
Veils in the dark impenetrable Night, 
And smiles if mortals stretch 

Care beyond bounds to mortal minds assigned. 

That which is present heed, and justly weigh ; 
All else flows onward as the river runs — 
Now, in mid-channel calm,t 

Peacefully gliding to Etruscan seas ; 

Now, when wild torrents chafe its quiet streams, 
Rolling, along with its resistless rush, 

* This fixes the season to the beginning of July, when Cepheus, a 
northern star below Ui'sa Minor, rises. Cepheus was mythically King 
of ^^thiopia, and father of Andromeda. Procyon rises about the same 
time, and is followed, eleven days afterwards, by Sirius. I/CO com- 
pletes the picture of summer heat. 

+ Orelli has "asquore" — most of the MSS. "alveo," — which last 
reading is adopted by Ritter, Yonge, and Munro. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXIX. 323 

Plenimque gratae divitibus vices, 
Mundaeque parvo sub lare paupemm 
Coenae, sine aulaeis et ostro, 
SoUicitam explicuere frontem. 

Jam clams occultum Andromedae pater 
Ostendit ignem ; jam Procyon furit, 
Et Stella vesani Leonis/* 
Sole dies referente siccos : 

Jam pastor umbras cum grege languido 
Rivumque fessus quaerit, et horridi 
Dumeta Silvani ; caretque 
Ripa vagis taciturna ventis. 

Tu civitatem quis deceat status 

Curas, et Urbi sollicitus times, 

Quid Seres et regnata Cyro 

Bactra parent Tanaisque discors. 

Prudens futuri temporis exitum 
Caliginosa nocte premit deus, 
Ridetque, si mortalis ultra 

Fas trepidat. Quod adest memento 

Componere sequus ; cetera fluminis 
Ritu feruntur, nunc medio alveot 
Cum pace delabentis Etruscum 
In mare, nunc lapides adesos 

Stirpesque raptas, et pecus et domos 
Volventis una, non sine montium 



324 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Loosed crags, uprooted trees, 

And herds and flocks, and the lost homes of men, 

While neighbouring forests, and far mountain-peaks 
Mingle their roar. Happy "^ indeed is he. 
Lord of himself, to whom 

'Tis given to say, as each day ends, " I have lived :" 

To-morrow let the Sire invest the heaven 
With darkest cloud or " purest ray serene," 
He mars not what has been. 

Nor from Time's sum blots out one fleeted hour. 

Fortune, exulting in her cruel task — 
Consistent in her inconsistent sport — 
Shifts favours to and fro. 

Now to myself, now to another kind. 

I praise her seated by me ; t if she shake 
Her parting wings I give back what she gave, 
And, in my virtue wrapped. 

Make honest Poverty my dowerless bride. 

'Tis not for me, when groans the mast beneath 
Fierce Africus, to gasp out piteous prayers. 
And bargain with the gods. 

Lest gainful bales from Cyprus or from Tyre 

Add to the treasures of the greedy deep ; 
Then from the wreck my slender boatj the gale 
And the Twin star shall speed. 

Safe with one rower through ^gaean storms. 

* " Cui licet in diem 
Dixisse Vixi." 
See Orelli's note against the usual interpretation of this passage. The 
meaning is, — " Happy the man who at the end of each day can say, * I 
have lived.' " Ritter connects "vixi" with all the lines that follow to 
the end of the ode— a construction which, I suspect, few critics will be 
inclined to favour. 

t " Laudo manentem." Orelli says that there is extant a rare coin 



BOOK III. — ODE XXIX. 325 

Clamore vicin^que silvae, 
Cum fera diluvies quietos 

Irritat amnes. Ille potens sui 
Laetusque deget, cui licet in diem 
Dixisse Vixi : * eras vel atra 
Nube polum Pater occupato, 

Vel sole puro ; non tamen irritum 
Quodcunque retro est, efficiet, neque 
Diffinget infectumque reddet, 
Quod fugiens semel hora vexit. 

Fortuna ssevo l^ta negotio, et 
Ludum insolentem ludere pertinax, 
Transmutat incertos honores, 
Nunc mihi, nunc alii benigna. 

Laudo manentem ; t si celeres quatit 
Pennas, resigno quae dedit, et mea 
Virtute me involvo probamque 
Pauperiem sine dote quaero. 

Non est meum, si mugiat Africis 
Malus procellis, ad miseras preces 
Decurrere ; et votis pacisci, 
Ne Cyprise Tyriaeque merces 

Addant avaro divitias mari : 
Tunc me, biremis praesidio scaphasj 
Tutum, per ^gaeos tumultus 
Aura feret geminusque Pollux. 

of the time of Commodus, inscribed " Fortunae Manenti," in which a 
woman is represented seated holding a horse by the halter with her right 
hand — in her left a cornucopia. I have availed myself of this image 
in translating *' manentem." 

X "Biremis scaphse," a two-oared boat, rowed by a single rower. — 
Orelli. 



326 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

I 

] 

ODE XXX. ■ 

PREDICTION OF HIS OWN FUTURE TIME. 

This ode appears clearly intended to be the completing ' 
poem of some considerable collection of lyrical pieces, 
forming in themselves an integral representation of the i 
idiosyncrasies of the poet in character and in genius, thus ' 
becoming his memorial or " monumentum." It is therefore 
generally regarded as the epilogue, not to the Third Book i 
only, but to all the first three books ; after the publication of ' 
which, Horace made a considerable pause before he published 
the Fourth. There is a great difference in tone between this 
and Ode xx. Book II., addressed to Maecenas. That ode, i 
half sportive, half earnest, seems written in the effervescence \ 
of animal spirits, and might have been called forth in any 
moment of brilliant success. But this is written in dignified ; 
and serious confidence in the firm establishment of the poet's 

fame. < 

I have built a monument than bronze more lasting, I 

Soaring more high than regal pyramids, ! 

Which nor the stealthy gnawing of the rain-drop, i 

Nor the vain rush of Boreas shall destroy ; ; 

Nor shall it pass away with the unnumbered ; 

Series of ages and the flight of time. ' 

I shall not wholly die ! From Libitina*" ^ 

A part, yea, much, of mine own self escapes. , 
Renewing bloom from praise in after ages, 

My growth through time shall be to fresher youth, ■ 

Long as the High Priest, with the Silent Virgin, i 

Ascends the sacred Capitol of Rome.t \ 

* Venus Libitina, the Funereal Venus — Death. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXX. 327 

fame. It is unnecessary to defend Horace here from the 
charge of vainglory, to which a modem poet, arrogating to 
himself the immortality of fame, would be exposed. The 
manners of an age decide the taste of an age. The heathen 
poets spoke of the immortality of their verses with as little 
scruple as Christian poets speak of the immortality of their 
souls. Not to mention the Greek poets, Dillenburger gives 
a tolerably long list of passages from the Latin — Ennius, 
Virgil, Propertius, Ovid, Martial — who spoke of their con- 
quest over time with no less confidence than Horace here 
does. The metre in the original is the same as that of 
Ode i. Book I., which perhaps strengthens the supposition 
that the poem is designed to complete a collection which 
that ode commenced. 



Carm. XXX. 

Exegi monumentum sere perennius, 
Regalique situ pyramidum altius ; 
Quod non imber edax, non Aquilo impotens 
Possit diruere, aut innumerabilis 
Annorum series et fuga temporum. 
Non omnis moriar, multaque pars mei 
Vitabit Libitinam.* Usque ego postera 
Crescam laude recens, dum Capitoliumt 



+ Viz., "while the Pontifex Maximus shall, on the ides of every 
month, go up to the Capitol to offer sacrifices to Vesta, her virgins 
walking solemnly in the procession, as they did, while the boys sang 
hymns in honour of the goddess. With a Roman this was equivalent 
to saying ' for ever,'" — Macleane. 



328 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

From mean estate exalted into greatness — 

Where brawls* loud Aufidus with violent wave, 
And aridt reigned o'er rustic subjects, Daunus — 

I, in the lips of men a household name, 
Shall have my record as the first who wedded 

To Roman melodies ^olian song. 
Take airs of state — the right is earned — and crown me. 

Willing Melpomene, with Delphic bay. 



* " Mantua Virgilio gaudet, Verona Catullo, 
Peligna8 dicar gloria gentis ego." 

— Ovid, Amores, iii. 15, 17. 
t *' Pauper aquae Daunus," " Daunus scant of water." The epithet 
is thus, by poetic licence, applied to the legendary king, which, in plain 
prose, belongs to the country he ruled — i.e., the southern part of Apulia, 
as the Aufidus flowed through the western. 



BOOK III. — ODE XXX. 329 

Scandet cum tacita Virgine pontifex. 
Dicar, * qua violens obstrepit Aufidus, 
Et qua pauper aquae Daunust agrestium 
Regnavit populorum, ex humili potens, \ 
Princeps Solium carmen ad Italos \ 

Deduxisse modos. Sume superbiam 
Qugesitam meritis, et mihi Delphica 
Lauro cinge volens, Melpomene, comam. 



330 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

THE SECULAR HYMN. 

Religious games, called Ludi Tarentini, Terentini, or 
Taurii, had been held in Rome from an early period of the 
Republic. Their origin is variously stated, though the most 
probable mythical accounts agree that they were instituted 
and devoted to Dis and Proserpina in consequence of a 
fearful plague — whether by one Valerius in gratitude for the 
recovery of his three children, or in the reign of Tarquinius 
Superbus in order to propitiate those formidable deities. In 
the latter case the plague had affected pregnant women, and 
their children died in the womb ; and sterile cows (Taureae) 
being sacrificed, the games were called Ludi Taurii. By 
these accounts it would seem that the games were connected 
with the health of offspring, and by all accounts that they 
were instituted in honour of Dis and Proserpina. To those 
eminent scholars who hold to the Etrurian origin of the 
Tarquins, "the Tarenti and Taurii are but as different forms 
of the same word, and of the same root as Tarquinius" 
(Smith's Diet, art. "Ludi Sseculares"). If so, the deities hon- 
oured were doubtless Etrurian — not Greek nor Roman — 
though the Romans subsequently identified them with divini- 
ties familiar to their own worship. 

Be that as it may, during the Republic these games appear 
to have been only celebrated three times, at irregular intervals 
in no way connected with fixed periods or cycles (saecula). 

When Augustus had completed (a.u.c. 737) the second 
lustre, or the ten years for which the imperial power was 
first confided to him, it was very natural that he should wish 
for the solemnity of an extraordinary festival at once popular 
and religious, and probably also the desire of establishing a 
dynasty would give rise to the idea of rendering this solem- 
nity regular, but at far-distant dates ; thus associating in- 
directly the duration of the Empire with the welfare and ex- 
istence of Rome. The custodiers of the Sibylline books, 
who had been increased from two to ten, and subsequently, 



THE SECULAR HYMN. 33 1 

probably by Sulla, to fifteen (quindecimviri), were ordered 
to consult those oracles, and they reported that the time 
was come to revive the old Tarentine games. They intro- 
duced, however, certain innovations, such as the cyclical 
or secular period, for their celebration (pretending that such 
periods had been always observed, or at least enjoined), 
and the substitution of Apollo and Diana for Dis and 
Proserpina. The latter change seems natural enough. 
Diana had among her attributes those of Proserpina, and 
Apollo was the deity whom Augustus especially honoured 
as his patron god. Dis and Proserpina were no longer 
in fashion, and were probably never very popular with the 
genuine Romans ; while, as the festival was not designed, 
like the old Tarentine games, for the averting of some 
national calamity or mortal disease, but rather to attest the 
blessings enjoyed under the Empire, and implore their con- 
tinuance, the direct invocation of the infernal divinities 
would have been very inappropriate ; and, indeed, their 
powers as averters of evil had become transferred to Apollo 
and Diana (as the sun and moon), who were also the be- 
stowers of good. Sacrifices were, however, offered to Dis 
and Proserpina on the first day of the ceremony among 
other gods, in the list of whom they are placed last. 
Still it may be seen in the following Hymn that much of 
the original character of the Tarentine or Taurian games 
was retained, however modified to suit altered circumstances. 
Diana is especially implored to protect mothers and mature 
their oft'spring. Augustus approaches the altar with white 
steers for sacrifice, as cows had been sacrificed to Dis in the 
Taurian games (though, as black animals had been offered to 
the infernal deities in time of calamity, the white colour of 
the steers was significant of the change to celestial divinities 
and the felicity of the period), and the games commenced 
in the Tarentum — i.e., the same ground that had been con- 
secrated to the Tarentine games. The nature and order of 
the ceremonies, which lasted three days and three nights, 



332 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

was intrusted to Ateius Capito, a celebrated jurist and anti- 
quary, and Horace was requested to compose the principal 
hymn on the occasion. The games were held in the sum- 
mer of the year B.C. 17. They were repeated four times 
during the Empire, but not at the periods enjoined by 
the Quindecimviri under Augustus — viz., in cycles of 
no years. The second took place, a.d. 47, in the reign 
of Claudius; the third, a.d. 88, in the reign of Domitian; 
and the fourth in the reign of Philippus, a.d. 248. For 
further particulars of the ceremony the general reader is re- 
ferred to Smith's Diet, art. " Ludi Saeculares"; and for the 
mystical belief that the world was moving in a cycle, the 
completion of which constituted the Magnus Annus, when 
all the heavenly bodies returned to their original relative 
places, see Orelli and Macleane's introduction to the Secular 
Hymn. As the length of the ten saecula which constituted 
the great Platonic year of the universe was not defined, but 
declared from time to time by prodigies from heaven, so 
this belief may account for the irregular periods in which 
the Secular Festival was held during the Empire. 

When Horace boasts (Lib. III. Carm. xxx.) that he shall 
be spoken of as the first who adapted ^olian song to 
Italian measures, he must mean something more than the 
mere introduction of Greek lyrical metres into the Italian 
language. In this task Catullus had preceded him. He 
nowhere mentions Catullus ; and though that omission has 
been ascribed to jealousy, there is no evidence of so envious 
a defect in Horace's general character. He bestows lavish 
praise on the eminent poets of his own time ; and a jealous 
poet is more apt to be jealous of living contemporaries than 
of defunct predecessors. Nor is it to be forgotten that, if 
Horace confines his boast to the mere introduction of Les- 
bian metres, the Sapphics of Catullus must have been suffi- 
ciently fresh in popular recollection to afford his enemies 
one of those opportunities for confuting a boast and turning 
it into ridicule which are not voluntarily courted by a man 



THE SECULAR HYMN. 333 

of such good sense and of such knowledge of the world as 
Horace is allowed to have been. And it is not to the 
Alcaic metre, but exclusively to the Sapphic, as connected 
with his name, that he refers, Lib. IV. Carm. vi. 

" Ego dis amicum, 
Saeculo festas referente luces, 
Reddidi carmen, docilis modorum 
Vatis Horati." 

Horace's boast, then, is only to be justified by the supposition 
that although Catullus had preceded him in the adoption of 
the Sapphic metre, he had not adapted it to song — had not 
incorporated it in the popular form of lyrical music — and 
Horace had done so, and been the first to do it. 

I apprehend, therefore, that Horace's vaunted originality 
consisted in being the first by whom the borrowed metres 
were set to Italian music — the first by whom, through arts 
not before divulged, the words were to be united with 
musical strings (" Non ante volgatas per artes Verba loquor 
socianda chordis" — Lib. IV. Carm. ix.), and thus popularised 
in banquet-halls and temples as national songs (Lib. HI. 
Carm. xi.) It seems to me that in this sense he says he 
is pointed out as "Romanse fidicen lyrae" (Lib. IV. Carm iii.), 
"fidicen" being a word especially applicable to a musician, 
and only metaphorically to a poet. 

That several of the odes were not adapted to singing 
does not invalidate this supposition. Such will be the case 
with every copious lyrical poet, who may, nevertheless, like 
Moore, have achieved his main popularity through the adapta- 
tion of his verse to musical accompaniment and national airs. 

Whether the music to which the measures employed by 
Horace were set was composed by himself in whole or in 
part, or by others, is a question on which there are no data 
for legitimate conjecture. If by himself, one might suppose 
that some record of the fact would be preserved by Suetonius 
or the scholiasts. On the other hand, if composed by 
another, it seems strange that a poet of character so grateful 



334 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

as Horace's should have refrained from all mention of one to 
whom he was under no mean obligations for the popularity 
his verses had acquired, and with whom he must have been 
necessarily brought into frequent and familiar intercourse. 
It may, however, be said, as sufficient reason for such silence 
in either case, that a Roman of Horace's day would not 
have held the art of a musical composer in high account. 

The writers who have sought to elucidate the obscure 
subject of ancient music consider it probable that nothing 
like the modern system of musical rhythm existed among 
the ancients, and that, since there is no mention of notation 
distinct from the metre of the song, the time was marked 
by that metre where vocal music was united with instru- 
mental (Burney's 'History of Music;' Hawkins's 'Hist, of 
Music;' Smith's Diet, art. ''Musica"). By this the reader 
can judge for himself M^hether Horace's task in timing the 
music to his own rhythms would not have been compara- 
tively easy; and whether, if it were thus easy, it would have 
been considered worthy of commemoration by his con- 
temporaries, or been preserved in such brief records of his 
life as were consulted by Suetonius, or known to the 
scholiasts. 

At all events, Horace appears, on the occasion of the 
Secular Hymn, to have superintended the rehearsal of the 

recitative 

O Phoebus, and O forest-queen Diana, 
Ye the twin lustrous ornament of heaven, 
Though ever holy, in this time most hallowed 
Be most benign to prayer ! 

For duly now, as Sibyl verse enjoins us. 
Pure youths, with chosen virgins linked in chorus, 
To Powers divine o'er the Seven Hills presiding. 
Uplift the solemn hymn. 



THE SECULAR HYMN. 335 

recitative as " diddffy.aXog" according to the custom of dra- 
matic and lyric poets of Greece ; and (Lib. IV. Carm. vi.) the 
young girls who take part in the chorus are enjoined not 
only to preserve the Lesbian metre, in which the hymn was 
composed, but to remember " poUicis ictum," the beat of 
his finger in marking time. 

Regarded only as a poem, the Secular Hymn, though it 
deserves higher praise than Macleane and other critics have 
bestowed on it, cannot be said to equal the genius exhibited 
in many of the odes, especially in Book III. But if set — 
whether by Horace himself, or by others whom he more or 
less schooled and directed — to some music which became a 
grand national air, such as " God save the King," or " The 
Marseillaise," we can readily account for the special pride 
with which he refers to it, and the increased rank which it 
appears to have won for him in popular estimation. 

In the Secular Hymn, and in some of the Sapphic odes 
of the Fourth Book, Horace more conforms than he does in 
the first three books to the Greek usage, in the variation of 
the caesura and the introduction of the trochee in the second 
place. I have judged it necessary, for the solemnity of 
feeling which is instilled into this poem, to add another foot 
to the fourth line in the translation. 

Carm. S^culare. 

Phoebe, silvammque potens Diana, 
Lucidum caeli decus, O colendi 
Semper et culti, date, quae precamur 
Tempore sacro ; 

Quo Sibyllini monuere versus 
Virgin es lectas puerosque castos 
Dis, quibus septem placuere colles, 
Dicere carmen. 



336 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

O Sun, the nurturer,''^ in bright chariot leading 
Day into Hght to hide it under shadow, 
Born still the same, yet other, mayst thou never 
See aught more great than Rome ! 

Blest Ilithyia,t mild to watch o'er mothers, 
And aid the timely coming of the new-born, 
Whether thou rather wouldst be as Lucina 
Or Genitalis hailed. 

Goddess as each, mature our offspring ; prosper 
The law that guards the sanctity of marriage, J 
And may it give new blossom and new fruitage 
To the grand parent-stem ! 

So that as each eleventh solennial decade 
Round to its close, this sacred feast renewing, 
In song and sport, assembled Rome may hallow 
Three days and joyous nights. 

And ye, O Parcse, who have sung prophetic 
Truths, § which, once said, the sure events determine, 
Fixed as divine decrees, — a glorious future 
Join to the glorious past. 

Fertile in fruits and flocks, let Earth maternal 
With spiked corn-wreath crown the brows of Ceres ; 

* " Alme Sol." This epithet is to be taken in its proper sense as 
derived from alo^ Sun the Nurturer. — Macleane. 

+ " Ilithyia." This name, here applied to Diana, is equally applicable 
to Juno, and, in the plural number, to the minor deities attending on child- 
birth. There appears to me, if I mistake not, a singular beauty which 
has escaped the commentators in the choice of names here given to 
Diana. Ilithyia and Lucina (the one Greek, the other Latin) are names 
which Diana shares with Juno, and therefore, as applied to childbirth, 
imply the children born in sacred wedlock. The name " Genitalis " 
is that which Diana shares with Venus, and therefore implies the off- 
spring of chaste if ardent love. Thus, " whether thou preferrest the 
name of Lucina or Genitalis," would mean, " whether thou preferrest 



s 

THE SECULAR HYMN. 337 

Alme Sol,* curru nitido diem qui 
Promis et celas, aliusque et idem 
Nasceris, possis nihil urbe Roma 
Visere majus. 

Rite maturos aperire partus 
Lenis, Ilithyia,t tuere matres ; 
Sive tu Lucina probas vocari, 
Seu Genitalis: 

Diva, producas sobolem, Patrumque 
Prosperes decreta super jugandis 
Feminis, prolisque novse feraci 
Lege marita : J 

Certus undenos decies per annos 
Orbis ut cantus referatque ludos, 
Ter die claro, totiesque grata 
Nocte frequentes. 

Vosque veraces cecinisse, § Parcse, 
Quod semel dictum est, stabilisque rerum 
Terminus servat, bona jam peractis 
Jungite fata. 

Fertilis frugum pecorisque Tellus 
Spicea donet Cererem corona ; 

the name that associates thee with Juno or that which associates thee 
with Love." 

X The Juhan law (de maritandis ordinibus), for the discouragement of 
celibacy and the regulation of marriage, was among the social and moral 
reforms aimed at by Augustus, and passed the year before the celebra- 
tion of the Secular games. It appears to have been a law well meant, 
but in some respects singularly unwise and impracticable. The unmar- 
ried person could not succeed to a legacy unless he married within a 
hundred days after the bequest. Fancy poor Horace himself condemned 
to decide between forfeiting the bequest of a villa at Tarentum or marry- 
ing some Glycera or Pyrrha ! 

§ Viz., the oracular Sibylline verses. 

Y 



338 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Pure from all taint let airs and dews of heaven 
Nourish the new-born life. 

Mild, all thine arrows sheathed within the quiver, 
Hear thy boy-suppliants, merciful Apollo j'^ 
Hear thy girl-votaries, crescent-crowned Luna, 
Queen of the clustered stars. 

If Rome be your work — if beneath your safeguard 
A band of wanderers, Ilion's scanty remnant. 
Ordained to change their city and their Lares, 
Have held this Tuscan land — 

They, unto whom, through Troy that blazed unharming, 
Pure-souled ^neas, his lost land's survivor, 
Opened free path, and heritage more ample 
Than aught relinquished gave ; 

Gods, grant to docile youth worth's upright manners — 
Gods, grant to placid age worth's calm contentment — 
Grant to the Roman race growth, power, and riches,t 
And all that can adorn ! 

Bless him who nears with milk-white steers your altars. 
Whose blood flows bright from Venus and Anchises ; 
Still every foe in battle may he conquer. 
And after conquest spare. 

Awed by our arms, and by the Alban lictors, J 
Now the Mede owns our power on land and ocean ; 
Now Ind and Scythia, she of late so haughty. 
To Rome for pardon sue. § 



* This line seems to refer to the new statue of the Apollo of Actium 
set up by Augustus in the Palatine temple. In the Apollo of Actium 
invoked by Augustus before his battle with M. Antony, the bow is bent 
— in the Apollo of the Palatine the bow is laid aside for the lyre and 
plectrum.— See Macleane's excellent note on this line. 



THE SECULAR HYMN. 339 

Nutriant fetus et aquae salubres, 
Et Jovis aurae. 

Condito mitis placidusque telo 
Supplices audi pueros, Apollo;* 
Siderum regina bicornis, audi, 
Luna, puellas : 

Roma si vestrum est opus, Iliseque 
Litus Etmscum tenuere turm^, 
Jussa pars mutare Lares et urbem 
Sospite cursu ; 

Cui per ardentem sine fraude Trojam 
Castus ^neas patriae superstes 
Liberum munivit iter, daturus 
Plura relictis ; 

Di, probos mores docili juventse, 
Di, senectuti placidae quietem, 
Romulse genti date remquet prolemque 
Et decus omne ! 

Quaeque vos bobus veneratur albis 
Clams Anchisae Venerisque sanguis, 
Impetret, bellante prior, jacentem 
Lenis in hostem ! 

Jam mari terraque manus potentes 
Medus, Albanasque timet secures ; J 
Jam Scythas responsa§ petunt, superbi 
Nuper, et Indi. 



+ " Remque prolemque." " Res" seems here used in its double sig- 
nification of power and riches. The nearest approach to its sense in a 
single word would perhaps be the old Anglo-Saxon "weal." 

X Viz., by our military prowess and civil justice. 

§ " Responsa petunt." " Responsa" here has many significations, the 



340 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Now Faith and Peace, and antique Shame and Honour 
Flock fearless back, and Virtue long-neglected ; 
And with them comes their sure companion Plenty, 
Rich with o'erflowing horn. 

May he adorned with fulgent bow — the Augur, 
Phoebus, the darling of the nine Camense — 
He the mild Healer, lifting the sore burden 
That weighs down weary limbs* — 

If shrines in Palatine he views with favour, 
The coming lustre bless, and link it onward 
To those yet brighter, through all time prolonging 
Rome and the Latian race. 

And oh, may She who holds the sacred hill-tops 
Of Aventine and Algidus, Diana, 
To the Fifteen,t and to her own young vot'ries. 
Lend an approving ear ! 

So we, the choir of Dian and of Phoebus, 
Versed in their praise, take home with us hope certain 
That, heard by Jove and each divine Immortal, 
These words are felt in heaven. 



choice of which may well baffle a translator. It may mean replies to 
proffered amity and submission — it may mean the opinions given by a 
jurisconsult to his client, or the mandates of the imperial government 
to its dependants — or it may mean replies to the prayer of the barbar- 
ians to be admitted to the protection and equity of the Roman laws, or 
the responses vouchsafed by an oracular or godlike power to a suppliant 
for relief or pardon. The last construction is adopted in the translation. 
* Apollo is here addressed in his fourfold capacity : istly, As the god 
of power, but adorned rather than armed (as at Actium) with his bow ; 
2dly, As the prophetic seer or augur (the religious attribute) ; 3dly, As 
the beloved of the Muses — i. <?., the patron of peaceful arts and letters ; 
4thly, As the divine healer, which may, perhaps, here be used in a 



THE SECULAR HYMN. 34 1 

Jam Fides, et Pax, et Honos, Pudorque 
Priscus, et neglecta redire Virtus 
Audet ; apparetque beata pleno 
Copia cornu. 

Augur, et fulgente decorus arcu 
Phoebus, acceptusque novem Camenis, 
Qui salutari levat arte fessos 
Corporis artus,* 

Si Palatinas videt aequus arces, 
Remque Romanam Latiumque felix 
Alterum in lustrum, meliusque sem.per 
Proroget asvum. 

Quaeque Aventinum tenet Algidumquc, 
Quindecim Diana preces virorum t 
Curet, et votis puerorum arnicas 
Applicet aures. 

Haec Jovem sentire, deosque cunctos, 
Spem bonam certamque domum reporto, 
Doctus et Phoebi chorus et Dianse 
Dicere laudes. 



latent signification, healer of the pains and wounds of the civil wars. 
Possibly all these attributes may have been symbolised in the pedestal 
of the statue, or on the walls of the Palatine temple, to which direct 
reference is made in the following stanza. 

t "Quindecim — virorum," the elect Fifteen who had the custody of 
the Sibyl books, the charge of the Secular games and solemnities, and 
in fact, were the priesthood of Apollo. — See Smith's Dictionar)^ art. 
* ' Ludi Saeculares. " 



342 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



BOOK IV.— ODE I. 

Frank e, in his ' Fasti Horatiani/ assumes the first three 
books of the Odes to have been composed between a.u.c. 
724 and 730, in which latter year, or in the beginning of 
731, they were given to the public, in the interval between 
Horace's thirty-eighth and forty-first year. Horace then 
appears to have devoted himself chiefly to his Epistles, and 
not to have published the Fourth Book of Odes till a.u.c. 
741, when he was in his fifty-second year. It is said that 
Augustus had expressed a desire for its publication, as com- 
prising the odes (iv. and xiv.) in honour of the victories of 
Drusus and Tiberius. These two odes are indeed unex- 
celled, even by the finest in the three preceding books ; nor 
are most of the others below the standard of Horace's matured 

genius. 
Wars long suspended, now 
Urgest thou, Venus ? Spare ! O spare ! I pray ; 

I am not what I was 
Under the reign of good Queen Cinara. 

Mother of loves so sweet, 
Thyself so cruel, cease to subject him 

Whom the tenth lustre finds 
No longer pliant to thy soft commands : 

Go where, with blandishing prayers, 
Youth calls thee back ; hearts easier kindled seek, 

And, borne on purple wings. 
Greet Paullus Maximus '^ in banquet hours. 

* If, as Estre observes (*Horat. Prosop,'), this be the Paullus Fabius 
Maximus who was consul A.U.C. 743, the words " centum artium puer " 
could scarcely be applied to him, even in the widest sense in which the 
poets took the word "puer" or "juvenis." In fact he could not well 
have been younger than Horace. On the other hand, if, as some com- 



BOOK IV. — ODE I. 343 

genius. The first ode was, he says himself, written in his 
fiftieth year. Macleane, in common with some other com- 
mentators, conjectures that it may have been an imitation 
from the Greek, and adds " that he may have pubhshed it 
to fill up his book, not as a prologue to it, as many of the 
chronologists say, — for what is there in this ode that bears 
that character ? " Not much, indeed, unless Horace wished 
to apprise his readers that they are not to expect in this 
book the lighter gallantries which had place in the former 
books. This book, indeed, only contains two love-poems 
besides the first — viz., the tenth and the eleventh; and 
one is glad to think that the tenth (omitted in the trans- 
lation) was merely an artistic imitation or translation from 
the Greek. 

Carm. I. 

Intermissa, Venus, diu 

Rursus bella moves ? Parce, precor, precor. 
Non sum qualis eram bonae 

Sub regno Cinarae. Desine, dulcium 

Mater saeva Cupidinum, 

Circa lustra decem flectere mollibus 
Jam durum imperils : abi, 

Quo blandae juvenum te revocant preces. 

Tempestivius in domum 

Paulli, purpureis ales oloribus, 
Comissabere Maximi,* 

Si torrere jecur quaeris idoneum : 



mentators, including Ritter, suppose, it was the son of this P. Maximub 
and the friend of Ovid who is meant, he would, it is true, have only been 
about twenty ; but how could the line "pro sollicitis non tacitus reis," 
which refers to his eloquence as an advocate, apply to a youth of that 
age? 



344 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Noble and fair is he ; 
Nor his the lips to pleading suitors mute ; 

Youth of a hundred arts 
To bear thy conquering standards wide and far ; 

Whene'er some rival, rich 
In gifts, he conquers, laughing, he shall place, 

By Alban waters, under citron roofs, 
Imaged in marble. Thee. 

There shalt thou take delight 
In spiced balms, and songs commingled sweet 

With Berecynthian fife 
And lyre — nor silent be the fluten reed. 

There, twice a-day, shall youths 
Choral with tender maidens, chant thy name, 

As thrice, in Salian dance, 
Quakes the green sod to feet that twinkle white. 

But me nor youth nor maid 
Allures, nor faith in intermingled souls, 

Nor to contend in wine ; 
No vernal flowerets wreathe my temples now. 

•X- -H^ -n- ■» '» 

* *i if ■» ■» 

* * »f # * 



BOOK IV. — ODE I. 

Namque et nobilis, et decens, 
Et pro sollicitis non tacitus reis, 

Et centum puer artium 

Late signa feret militiae tuse : 

Et, quandoque potentior 

Largi muneribus riserit asmuli, 

Albanos prope te lacus 

Ponet marmoream, sub trabe citrea. 

Illic plurima naribus 

Duces thura, lyr^que et Berecyntic'e 
Delectabere tibi^ 

Mixtis carminibus, non sine fistula. 

Illic bis pueri die 

Numen cum teneris virginibus tuum 
Laudantes, pede candido 

In morem Salium ter quatient humum. 

Me nee femina nee puer 

Jam nee spes animi credula mutui, 
Nee certare juvat mero, 

Nee vincire novis tempora floribus. 

Sed cur heu, Ligurine, cur 

Manat rara meas lacrima per genas ? 
Cur facunda parum decoro 

Inter verba cadit lingua silentio ? 

Noctumis ego somniis 

Jam captum teneo, jam volucrem sequor 
Te per gramina Martii 

Campi, te per aquas, dure, volubiles. 



345 



34^ THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE 11. 

TO ZULUS ANTONIUS. 

lulus Antonius was the second son of M. Antony the 
triumvir by Fulvia ; the elder, Antyllus, was put to death by 
Octavian after the battle of Actium. lulus, then in his 
infancy, was brought up with great tenderness by his step- 
mother Octavia, married her daughter Marcella, and rose to 
the highest honours of the State — praetor, a.u.c. 741 ; con- 
sul, A.u.c. 744. His end was tragical. He was either 
executed by Augustus or destroyed himself, a.u.c. 752, in 
the forty-second year of his age, on the charge of adultery 
with Julia, to which crime he is said to have been induced 
by ambitious designs on the Empire. lulus possessed the 
literary accomplishments for which so many of the Roman 
nobles in that day were remarkable. He was a pupil of L. 
Crassitius, a celebrated grammarian, at whose school were 
instructed youths of the first Roman families. According to 
the scholiasts, he composed not only works in prose, but 
twelve books in heroic verse upon Diomed, which Acron 
styles " egregios ; " though, as Macleane observes with his 
customary good sense, "As it is most likely Acron never 

saw 
lulus, he who would with Pindar vie, 
Soars, with Daedalian art, on waxen wings, 
And falling, gives his name unto the bright 
Deeps of an ocean.* 

As from the mountain-top a headlong stream, 
Nourished by rains beyond familiar banks. 
So seethes, and, measureless with utterance deep, 
Rushes down Pindar. 

* As Icarus gave his name to the Icarian sea. 



BOOK IV. — ODE 11. 347 

saw them, his testimony is not worth much." Horace, how- 
ever, in this ode pays a high comphment to his poetic 
powers. The ode itself is a noble homage to Pindar, and 
interesting for Horace's estimate of his own peculiar powers, 
and his frank confession of the pains he took with his verses. 
The poem was written during Augustus's absence from Rome 
for two years, when, a.u.c. 737, the Sygambri, a fierce German 
tribe (whose name Jac. Grimm derives from " sigu," victory, 
and ''gomber," strong), had, with two other tribes, invaded 
the Roman territory in Gaul, and defeated the Roman legate 
Lollius with great slaughter. Augustus went in person into 
Gaul. The German tribes retreated at his approach, gave 
hostages, and obtained peace. Augustus, however, did not 
return to Rome till he had restored order in Germany, Gaul, 
and Spain. As he was expected in Rome long before he 
returned, the ode was probably written soon after the 
Sygambri had given hostages and obtained peace, a.u.c. 
738, or beginning of 739. It is commonly supposed that 
Antonius had urged Horace to celebrate the triumphs of 
Augustus in Pindaric style, and that he modestly excuses 
himself from that request. The tone of the ode favours this 
assumption, though it does not leave it clear that Antonius 
had made such a request. 



Carm. II. 

Pindarum quisquis studet semulari, 
lule, ceratis ope Daedalea 
Nititur pennis vitreo daturus 
Nomina ponto.* 

Monte decurrens velut amnis, imbres 
Quem super notas aluere ripas, 
Fervet immensusque ruit profundo 
Pindarus ore ; 



34^ THE ODES OF HORACE. 

All due to him Apollo's laureate crown, 
Whether through daring dithyrambs he roll 
Language new-formed,"^ borne on the lawless wave 
Of his wild music ; 

Whether he sing of gods or god-born kings, 
By whom the Centaurs with just doom were slain, 
And dire Chimera's flame was quenched ; or those 
Palm-crowned in Elis, 

Led as Celestials home ; and chants the strife 
Of steed or cestus ; offering gifts, o'er time 
More potent than a hundred monuments 
Wrought from the marble ; 

Or wails the youth snatched from a weeping bride, 
And, in lamenting, lifts his force of soul. 
Valour, and golden worth, unto the stars, 
Foiling black Orcus. 

Ample the gale which buoys the Theban swan. 
Oft as he seeks his altitude in clouds. 
I, like the bee of the Matinian hill, 
Gather the wild-thyme. 

With lavish labour hiving thrifty sweets ; 
Lowly, by Tibur's grove and dewy banks, 
I seek the honey that I store in song,t 
Kneaded with labour. 

But thou, the minstrel of a grander lyre, 
Celebrate Caesar, when his laurelled brow 



* ** Nova verba," " new forms of expression. " 

+ " Carmina fingo." "Fingo" corresponds to '' irXdrrw" which j 
word the Greeks used especially with reference to the making of honey, l 
- -Orelli, Macleane. 



BOOK IV. — ODE II. 349 

Laurea donandus Apollinari, 
Seu per audaces nova dithyrambos 
Verba * devolvit numerisque fertur 
Lege solutis ; 



Seu deos regesve canit, deorum 
Sanguinem, per quos, cecidere justa 
Morte Centauri, cecidit tremendae 
Flamma Chimaerse ; 

Sive quos Elea domum reducit 
Palma cselestes, pugilemve equumve 
Dicit et centum potiore signis 
Munere donat ; 

Flebili sponsae juvenemve rap turn 
Plorat, et vires animumque moresque 
Aureos educit in astra, nigroque 
Invidet Oreo. 



Multa Dircaeum levat aura cycnum, 
Tendit, Antoni, quotiens in altos 
Nubium tractus. Ego apis Matin ae 
More modoque, 

Grata carpentis thyma per laborem 
Plurimum circa nemus uvidique 
Tiburis ripas operosa parvus 
Carmina fingo.t 

Concines majore poeta plectro 
Caesarem, quandoque trahet feroces 



350 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Looks from the car which, up the sacred hill, 
Drags the Sygambri ; 

He, than whom never to this earth have Fate 
And kind gods given, nor shall give, ev'n if yet 
The Golden Age come back to mortals, aught 
Better or greater. 

Chant thou the games that honour the return 
Of brave iVugustus granted to our prayer ; 
The joyous feast-days, the hushed courts of law, 
Vacant of suitors. 

Then, too, if aught that I can speak be heard. 
My voice shall aid to swell the choral hymn. 
And sing " All hail, thou fair auspicious sun,* 
Bringing back Caesar ! " 

And while, O god of triumph, slowly ont 
He moves in state, shout upon shout repeats 
" lo Triumphe ! " through the length of Rome ; 
Frankincense steaming 

Up to benignant gods. Ten bulls, ten kine. 
Acquit thy vow; a single steerling mine. 
Fresh-weaned, and browsing into youth amid 
Prodigal pastures ; 



* "Et, OSol 
Pulcher ! O laudande ! canam, recepto 
Caesare felix." 
It is uncertain whether "felix" refers to Horace, as "happy in the re- 
turn of Caesar," or to the sun, foraiing part of the exclamation ; IVIac- 
leane leaves the choice to the reader's taste ; Vossius and others prefer 
the latter application ; Orelli considers the former more tender. To me 
it seems more according to the genius of lyrical composition to apply 
the epithet to the sun. We know already that Horace is happy in the 
return of Caesar, otherwise he would not be joining in the procession and 
the hymn. 



BOOK IV. — ODE II. 351 

Per sacrum clivum merita decorus 
Fronde Sygambros, 

Quo nihil majus melius ve terris 
Fata donavere bonique divi, 
Nee dabunt, quam\ds redeant in aurum 
Tempora priscum. 

Concines IcCtosque dies et Urbis 
Publicum ludum super impetrato 
Fortis Augusti reditu, forumque 
Litibus orbum. 

Tum meae, si quid loquar audiendum, 
Vocis accedet bona pars, et, O Sol 
Pulcher ! O laudande 1 canam, recepto 
C^sare felix.* 

Teque, dum procedit, io Triumphe,t 
Non semel dicemus, io Triumphe, 
Civitas omnis dabimusque divis 
Thura benignis. 

Te decern tauri totidemque vaccse, 
Me tener solvet vitulus, relicta 
Matre qui largis juvenescit herbis 
In mea vota, 



t " Teque, dum procedit, io Triumphe," not " tumque dum procedit," 
as in some of our popular editions. It is the god Triumph which is 
invoked by " io Triumphe." OreUi prefers "procedit" to " procedis," 
which has good authority in the MSS. (see his note), and refers it to 
Augustus : "O god of Triumph; while he, Augustus, proceeds, we," &c. 
Macleane sees no reason for this preference, and adopts the text of 
Dillenburger, "procedis," which is also favoured by Ritter and Munro. 
Yonge follows Orelli. 



352 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

His frontal imitates the curved gleam 
Of the young moon in her third night ; — all else 
Of tawny colour, on that front of snow- 
Shimmers her signet* 



* The conclusion of the ode has been, plausibly enough, blamed for 
a discrepancy amounting to bathos between the gravity and elevation of 
the preceding stanzas, and the familiar details of the steerling to be 
sacrificed — "Desinit in vitulum mulier formosa superne" (Steiner), 
Orelli, on the contrary, thinks it conformable to poetic art, that the 
height of enthusiasm should subside, as it were, in the placid anticipa- 
tion of the destined sacrifice. Possibly Horace meant also, in describ- 
ing the animal so minutely as already reserved for the sacrifice, to imply 
how eagerly expected was the return of Augustus ; — the victims were 
already marked, the preparations already made. 



BOOK IV. — ODE II. 353 I 

Fronte curvatos imitatus ignes \ 

Tertium Lunse referentis ortum, ? 

Qua notam duxit, niveus videri, \ 

Cetera fulvus.* j 



354 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE III. i 

TO MELPOMENE. 

The sweetness and dignity of this ode have been a theme ■ 
of unquahfied praise to the critics. It was evidently written [ 
after the Secular Hymn, which gave authority and sanction 
to Horace's claim to be " Romanae fidicen lyrae." 

Whom thou, Melpomene, 
Hast once with still bright aspect marked at birth,* ] 

On him no Isthmian toils 
Shall shed the lustre of an athlete's fame ; ] 

Him shall no fiery steed i 

Ravish to victory in Achaian car ; ^ 

In him no warlike deeds \ 

Shall, from the hill-top of the Capitol, t \ 

Show to a world's applause \ 

The glorious image of a conquering chief, ] 

AVith Delian leaves adorned. 

Who crushed the swelling menaces of kings ; \ 

Yet him shall streams that flow \ 

Through fertile Tibur, and the thick-grown locks ! 

Of the green forest-kings, ] 

Endow with lordship — in ^olian song. I 

Me have the sons of Rome, ^ 

Sovereign of cities, deigned to enrol amidst .^ 

The choir beloved of bards ; 

And now even Envy bites with milder fang. \ 



* " Nascentem placido lumine videris." The image here is taken ; 

from astrology. To Melpomene is ascribed the influence of the planet '. 
ascendant at birth, and by which, in technical terms, the "Native" (or 

new-born) is "aspected." J 

l 



BOOK IV. — ODE III. 355 



Carm. III. 

Quern tu, Melpomene, semel 

Nascentem placido lumine videris,"^ 

Ilium non labor Isthmius 

Clarabit pugilem, non equus impiger 

Curru ducet Achaico 

Victorem, neque res bellica Deliis 
Ornatum foliis ducem, 

Quod regum tumidas contuderit minas, 

Ostendet Capitolio : t 

Sed quae Tibur aquse fertile prsfluunt, 
Et spissae nemorum comas, 

Fingent ^olio carmine nobilem. 

Romae principis urbium 

Dignatur soboles inter amabiles 
Vatum ponere me choros ; 

Et jam dente minus mordeor invido. 



f "Neque res bellica Deliis 
Ornatum foliis ducem, 

Quod regum tumidas contuderit minas, 
Ostendet Capitolio." 
"Ostendet" is a word borrowed from the ceremonies designed for 
pomp and ostentation. The victorious general was shown at the 
Capitol, where he returned thanks to Jove and the gods, deposited 
the spoils, and received the homage of the world. — TORRENTIUS, 
Dacier. 



3S6 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

O thou Pierian Muse, 
That tun'st the sweet clash of the golden shell ; 

Thou who, if such thy will, 
Couldst make mute fishes musical as swans, 

Thine is the boon, all thine, 
That I am singled from the passers-by, 

" Lyrist of Roman song ! " — 
Thine that I breathe and please, if please I may.^ 



* "Quod spiro," "that I breathe the breath of song" — "quod 
movet me spiritus poeticus." — Dillenburger, Orelli, Ritter. 



BOOK IV. — ODE III. 357 

O testudinis aureae 

Dulcem quae strepitum, Fieri, temperas, 
O, mutis quoque piscibus 

Donatura cycni, si libeat, sonum, 

Totum muneris hoc tui est, 

Quod monstror digito praetereuntium 
Romanae fidicen lyrae : 

Quod spire et placeo, si placeo, tuum est.*' 



358 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE IV. 

IN PRAISE OF DRUSUS AND THE RACE OF THE NEROS. 

When, A.u.c. 738-9, Augustus and Tiberius were in Trans- 
alpine Gaul, the fierce tribes of the Vindelici and Raeti (the 
first occupying a considerable range of country between the 
Danube and Lake Constance, the last neighbouring them to 
the south, and extending to Lake Como) made forays into 
Italy and Cisalpine Gaul, attended with great cruelty and 
massacre. Augustus sent against them Drusus, the younger 
brother of Tiberius, who was then in his twenty-third year. 
He defeated and drove them from Italy. It is clearly in 
honour of the victory under Drusus that the ode is com- 
posed. But as these tribes renewed their predatory incur- 
sions into Gaul, Tiberius was sent to the aid of Drusus with 
additional forces. Thus united, the two brothers reduced 
these and other tribes — such as the Genauni and Breuni 
— into the Roman province of R^tiae (Rastia Prima and 
Secunda). It was in honour of this completed conquest, 
and of the part which Tiberius had in it, that Ode xiv. was 
composed, and, as may be reasonably supposed, somewhat 
subsequently to Ode iv. The opening of this poem is un- 
usually 
Even as the thunder's winged minister — 
To whom, proved true to Jove's entrusted charge 
In gold-haired Ganymede, 

Heaven's king gave kingdom over wandering birds — 

Urged from his eyrie by the goad of youth. 
And pulses glowing with ancestral fire. 
Learns from the winds of spring. 

When gone the rain-clouds, timidly to soar, 

Till on the sheepfold rushes down its foe ; 
Next, bolder grown, the hungering greed not less 



BOOK IV.— ODE IV. 359 

usually lengthy and involved. It takes four strophes, or 
sixteen verses, before it disentangles itself of its similes, and 
reaches their application. I do not think that it deserves 
the blame some critics have attached to it for the slowness 
and complication with which the image of the young eagle 
is worked out ; perhaps, indeed, the hesitating efforts of the 
bird before it gathers strength to attack dragons are artisti- 
cally expressed in the labour of the verse. But I venture 
to doubt whether the poem would not have been better 
without the second simile of the lion-whelp, which has no 
novelty to recommend it, and is very inferior in picturesque 
vigour to the first one, while it is less appropriate to the 
eulogy on Drusus. The young eagle training itself to grap- 
ple with dragons that resist it, conveys an image of force 
against force ; but it is very little honour to a lion-whelp to 
conquer a helpless roe-deer or she-goat. " Caprea" means 
either, but Yonge appears to me right in giving the former 
interpretation to the word in this passage. Ritter vindicates 
the simile of the lion-whelp, observing that the illustration 
of the sheepfold and the dragons would not be appropriate 
to the Raeti, and that therefore the poet adds the image by 
which they and Drusus are comprehended. 

Carm. IV. 

Qualem ministrum fulminis alitem, 
Cui rex deorum regnum in aves vagas 
Permisit, expertus fidelem 
Juppiter in Ganymede flavo, 

Olim juventas et patrius vigor 
Nido laborum propulit inscium : 
Vemique, jam nimbis remotis, 
Insolitos docuere nisus 

Venti paventem : mox in ovilia 
Demisit hostem vividus impetus : 



360 THE ODES OF HORACE. ^ 

■ ' 

Of battle than of food, , 

Drives him on dragons that resist his beak ; ; 

Or as in gladsome pastures the wild roe, ; 

About to die by fangs unfleshed before, i 

! Sees the fierce lion-whelp, : 

Fresh from the udders of the tawny dam ; — ' 

So the Vindelici young Drusus saw 

Leading war home to their own Rsetian Alps ; * 

Whence from all time they learned I 

To arm their hands with Amazonian axe t 

I pause not now to ask ; nor is the lore j 

Of all things lore allowed ; enough that hosts, \ 

Victorious long and far, j 

Vanquished in turn by a young arm and brain, j 

Felt what the mind and what the heart achieve, i 

When reared and fostered amidst blest abodes, ! 
And with parental love 

A Caesar's soul inspires a Nero's sons. , 

Brave and good natures generate natures brave. 
In steer and steed ancestral virtue shows. j 

Bold eagles never yet, \ 

Instead of eaglets, begot timorous doves. | 



* " Videre Rsetis bella sub Alpibus." Macleane agrees with Orelli 
in adopting Bentley's emendation — "Rsetis" instead of "Rseti." — See 
Orelli's excursus to this ode, and Macleane's comprehensive note. Ritter 
and Munro have "Raeti." 

t "Quibus 
Mos unde deductus per omne 
Tempus Amazonia securi 
Dextras obarmet, quasrere distuli : 
Nee scire fas est omnia," 
These lines are so little in poetic keeping with the noble earnestness of 



BOOK IV. — ODE IV. 361 

Nunc in reluctantes dracones 
Egit amor dapis atque pugnae : 

Qualemve laetis caprea pascuis 
Intenta fulv^ matris ab ubere 
Jam lacte depulsum leonem, 
Dente novo peritura vidit : 

Videre R^tis bella sub Alpibus* 
Drusum gerentem Vindelici ; quibus 
Mos unde deductus per omne 
Tempus Amazonia securi t 

D extras obarmet, quaerere distuli : 
Nee scire fas est omnia ; sed diu 
Lateque victrices catervae, 
Consiliis juvenis revictse, 

Sen sere, quid mens rite, quid indoles 
Nutrita faustis sub penetralibus, 
Posset, quid Augusti paternus 
In pueros animus Nerones. 

Fortes creantur fortibus et bonis ; 
Est in juvencis, est in equis patrum 
Virtus ; neque imbellem feroces 
Progenerant aquilae columbam. 



those immediately before and after them, that they have been summarily 
rejected by several editors, and Franke asserts them to be a silly hiter- 
polation. They are, however, justly no doubt, considered genuine by 
the best of the later authorities. Nor, indeed, are they inconsistent 
with Horace's habit of introducing a sudden change of playfulness or 
irony in the midst of his gravest verse. To me they seem evidently a 
satirical allusion either to some rival poem or to some prosy archaeolo- 
gical treatise of his own day upon the origin or customs of the Vindelici ; 
and we lose the point because we have lost the poem or the treatise. 
Ritter vindicates the digression, and cites in precedent. Find. 01. I. 
28-42. 



362 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Still training speeds the inborn vigour's growth ) ] 

Sound culture is the armour of the breast. \ 

Where fails the moral lore, 

Vice disennobles even the noblest born. I 

What to the Neros owest thou, O Rome ! 
Witness Metaurus, routed Hasdrubal, \ 

And that all-glorious day J 

Which chased from Latium the receding shades, 

First dawn that laughed with victory, what time 

Rode through Italia the dire African, ■ 

As fire through forest-pines, J 

Or Eurus over the Sicilian waves. 1 

But from that day, labouring illustrious on, 
Victory to victory linked, the Roman grew — 
Till in the shrines laid waste 

By Punic riot and fierce sacrilege. 

Once more erect stood forth the gods of Rome. 
Then thus outspoke perfidious Hannibal : | 

" We deer, foredoomed as prey 

To ravenous wolves, our own destroyers chase, i 

" Whom 'tis our amplest triumph to elude, 1 

And, hiding from, escape. Race which, cast forth ; 

A waif on Tuscan seas • 

From Troy's red crater, still had strength to house \ 

*' In cities ravished from Ausonian soil, i 

Its gods, its worship, and its grey-haired sires, j 

Yea, and its new-born babes, i 

The destined fathers of the men to be ; 

" Even as the ilex, lopped by axes rude, ' 

Where, rich with dusky boughs, soars Algidus, I 



BOOK IV. — ODE IV. 363 

Doctrina sed vim promovet insitam, 
Rectique cultus pectora roborant ; 
Utcunque defecere mores, 
Indecorant bene nata culpae. 

Quid debeas, O Roma, Neronibus, 
Testis Metaunim flumen, et Hasdmbal 
Devictus, et pulcher fugatis 
Ille dies Latio tenebris. 

Qui primus alma risit adorea. 
Dims per urbes Afer ut Italas, 
Ceu flamma per taedas, vel Eurus 
Per Siculas equitavit undas. 

Post hoc secundis usque laboribus 
Romana pubes crevit, et impio 
Vastata Poenorum tumultu 
Fana deos habuere rectos : 

Dixitque tandem perfidus Hannibal :' 
' Cervi, luporum prseda rapacium, 
Sectamur ultro, quos opimus 

Fallere et effugere est triumphus. 

Gens, quae cremato fortis ab Ilio 
Jactata Tuscis aequoribus sacra, 
Natosque maturosque patres 
Pertulit Ausonias ad urbes, 

Duris ut ilex tonsa bipennibus 
Nigrae feraci frondis in Algido, 



364 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Through loss, through wounds, receives 

New gain, new life — yea, from the very steel : 

" Not fiercer did the Hydra hewn, regrow 
Against Alcides, chafed to be o'ercome ; 
Nor dragon-teeth, earth-sown 

In Thebes or Colchis, spring to armed men ; 

" Merged in the deeps, more fair comes forth its star :* 
Wrestle and win, it bears the winner down ; 
And widowed wives shall tell 

Of victors vanquished on the fields it fought.t 

" No more to Carthage shall I send proud news ; 
Dies, dies the power, the fortune, the renown 
Of the great Punic name ; 

Dies hope itself, for Hasdrubal is slain. J 

" There's nought the hands of men from Claudius sprung 
Shall not achieve, with Jove their guardian god, 
Through the sharp stress of war 

Sped by the providence of heedful cares." 

* "Evenit." OrelH, following Jahn, has "exiit" — a reading un- 
sanctioned by more recent editors. 

f "Proelia conjugibus loquenda." Orelli considers that the line re- 
fers to the Roman wives speaking with exultation of the wars waged by 
their husbands. Ritter, on the other hand, powerfully supports the 
interpretation of Mitscherlich — viz., that the line refers to the widows 
of the slain. His argument seems to me convincing. 

+ Torrentius considers that here ends the speech attributed to Han- 
nibal, and that in the last verse Horace speaks in his own person — 
an opinion which has had many followers, and is defended by Ritter. 
Orelli, supported by Macleane and Yonge, on the other hand, contends 
that the speech of Hannibal is continued to the close of the ode — 
firstly, because it is more complimentary to the Neros that their praise 
and predicted renown should come from the mouth of their foe ; second- 
ly, because it is more poetical to conclude the poem with the prophecy 
of Hannibal, and more in the spirit of Pindar, as Olymp, 4, and Nem. 4. 
Munro gives his authority to this reading. 



BOOK IV. — ODE IV. 365 

Per damna, per caedes, ab ipso 
Ducit opes animumque ferro. 

Non Hydra secto corpore firmior 
Vinci dolentem crevit in Herculem, 
Monstrumve submisere Colchi 
Majus, Echioniaeve Thebas. 

Merses profundo, pulchrior evenit ; * 
Luctere, multa proruet integrum 
Cum laude victorem, geretque 
Proelia conjugibus loquenda.t 

Carthagini jam non ego nuntios 
Mittam superbos : occidit, occidit 
Spes omnis et fortuna nostri 

Nominis, Hasdrubale interempto.J 



Nil Claudias non perficient manus ; 
Quas et benigno numine Jupiter 
Defendit, et curae sagaces 
Expediunt per acuta belli.' 



366 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE V. 

TO AUGUSTUS, THAT HE WOULD HASTEN HIS RETURN 
TO ROME. 

This ode, which Dillenburger rightly calls " dulcissimum 
carmen," may be taken in connection with the preceding 
and with Ode xiv. It was composed during the absence 
of Augustus in Germany and Gaul, and after the victories 
of Tiberius and Drusus. Augustus had been absent from 
September a.u.c. 738 to February 741. In the description 
of the blessings ascribed to the reign of Augustus, the se- 
curity to life and property, the reformation of the previous 

licence 
Best guardian of the race of Romulus, 
And sprung thyself from deities benign. 
Absent too long, fulfil thy promise, pledged 
To Rome's high court* — return. 

Bring to thy country back, beloved chief, 
The light : thy looks are to thy people Spring, 
And where they smile, more grateful glides the day. 
More genial shines the sun. 

As the fond mother with all passionate prayers 
Calls back the son more than one year away. 
By adverse winds beyond Carpathian seas 
Kept from sweet home afar. 

Fixing intent upon the curving shore 
The unmoving stillness of her wistful eyes ; — 
So for her Caesar, smit with faithful love, 
His country looks and pines. 

* '* Sancto concilio" — the Senate. 



BOOK IV. — ODE V. 367 

licence of manners, — in short, the change from the calami- 
ties of civil war to the felicity of a government firm in 
maintaining order, and mild enough to be popular beyond 
all recorded precedent, Horace conveys his own vindication 
from the charge inconsiderately made against him for his 
attachment to the empire, and his enthusiasm for the em- 
peror. And however adulatory the language he employs 
may appear to modern taste, it is no exaggerated expression 
of the common national sentiment in the times which had 
exalted Augustus to a share in the honours privately as well 
as publicly paid to the gods. 



Carm. V. 

Divis orte bonis, optime Romulas 
Gustos gentis, abes jam nimium diu j 
Maturum reditum pollicitus Patrum 
Sancto concilio, redi."^ 

Lucem redde tuae, dux bone, patriae : 
Inster veris enim voltus ubi tuus 
Affulsit populo, gratior it dies, 
Et soles melius nitent. 

Ut mater juvenem, quem Notus invido 
Flatu Carpathii trans maris aequora 
Cunctantem spatio longius annuo 
Dulci distinct a domo, 

Votis ominibusque et precibus vocat, 
Curvo nee faciem litore dimovet : 
Sic desideriis icta fidelibus 
Quaerit patria Caesarem. 



368 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Safe * plods the steer among the rural fields ; 
The rural fields Ceres and Plenty bless ; 
The winged ships fly through unmolested seas ; t 
Honour's fine dread of shame 

Returns ; no lusts pollute the modest home ; 
Licence is tamed by manners as by laws ; :|: 
Nor reads the husband in his infant's face 
A likeness not his own. 

Fast by Crime stands its comrade Punishment. 
Who fears the Parthian, who the frozen Scyth? 
Who (Caesar safe) whatever monstrous birth 
Germania's womb conceives ? 

Let fierce Iberia threaten war — who cares ? 
Each spends safe days on his own hills, and weds 
His vine to widowed elms, then, home regained. 
Brims his glad cup to thee, 

Blending with prodigal libation prayers ; § 
And, as Greece honoured Leda's starry son, 
Or great Alcides, — with his household gods 
Mingles thy hallowed name. 

* I.e., under the auspices of Augustus. ' ' Rura perambulat. " I adopt 
Ritter's interpretation that this refers to the ox at the plough, not rov- 
ing through the pastures. Pales presided over pastures ; Ceres, named 
in the following line, over fields under the plough. The repetition of 
"rura" — " bos rura perambulat, Nutrit rura Ceres," condemned as a 
false reading by Bentley and other critics less illustrious, appears to me a 
peculiar beauty. "Faustitas" is another name for '* Copia," "plenty." 

f " Pacatum per mare." "Pacatum," "unmolested by pirates." 
The gratitude of the merchantmen and sailors to Augustus (then Octa- 
vian) for putting down piracy is very forcibly expressed in Suetonius, 
Oct. 98. 

X Horace here refers to the " Lex Julia de Adulteriis," passed by 
Augustus, A.U.C. 737, and also to an improved standard of national 
manners. Dion. Cassius {54, 19) implies that one reason for Augustus's 
expedition to Gaul (that is, absenting himself from Rome) was to get 
rid of scandal in regard to his alleged intrigue with Terentia, the wife 



BOOK IV. — ODE V. 369 

Tutus bos etenim rura perambulat,* 
Nutrit rura Ceres, almaque Faustitas, 
Pacatum volitant per mare navitae, t 
Culpari metuit Fides, 

Nullis polluitur casta domus stupris, 
Mos et lex maculosum edomuit nefas,J 
Laudantur simili prole puerperae, 
Culpam Poena premit comes. 

Quis Parthum paveat ? quis gelidum Scythen ? 
Quis Germania quos horrida parturit 
Fetus, incolumi Csesare ? quis fer^ 
Bellum curet Hiberi^ ? 

Condit quisque diem collibus in suis, 
Et vitem viduas ducit ad arbores ; 
Hinc ad vina redit laetus, et alteris 
Te mensis adhibet deum ; § 

Te multa prece, te prosequitur mero 
Defuso pateris, et Laribus tuum 
Miscet numen, uti Gr^cia Castoris 
Et magni memor Herculis. 

of Maecenas — which Macleane rightly dismisses as mere gossip. It is 
pretty clear, by these verses, either that Horace had heard of no such 
scandal, or that both he and Maecenas regarded it with contempt. A 
poet of so exquisite a taste, and so consummate a knowledge of the 
world, would not have ventured on the line, "Nullis polluitur casta 
domus stupris," if such scandal were rife at that very time, or, at least, 
if any credit were attached to it ; for thus the compliment would have 
been turned into a bitter irony against Augustus, and a cruel insult to 
Maecenas. 

§ Literally " at his second course;" or rather, as we should say, " at 
dessert" — "alteris mensis." By a decree of the Senate, libations were 
to be offered to Octavian after the battle of Actium at private tables as 
well as in public banquets, and his name to be inscribed in hymns of 
praise as those of the gods. — Dion. Cass., 1. 1-19. It is to these 
national honours that Horace alludes whenever he speaks of Augustus 
as enrolled among the gods. 

2 A 



370 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Live, O good chief, Rome's feast-days to prolong ! 
This is our orison at sober mom. 
Our prayer with wine-dews on the Hp, when sinks 
Underneath seas the sun. 



BOOK IV.— ODE V. 371 

Longas, O utinam, dux bone, ferias 
Pr^stes Hesperiae ! dicimus integro 
Sicci mane die, dicimus uvidi, 
Cum Sol Oceano subest. 



372 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE VI. 

TO APOLLO. 

This ode may be considered the prooemium to the Secular 
Hjrmn, A.u.c. 737, although evidently written after it. As 
that hymn celebrates Apollo and Diana, so this ode appro- 
priately commences with an invocation to Apollo, whom 
Horace invokes (line 27) to defend the dignity of the 

Roman 
God, in whom Niobe's sad offspring felt 
The stern chastiser of the vaunting tongue, 
And Tityos vast, the ravisher, — and he, 
Phthian Achilles, 

Almost the victor of high Troy (to thee 
Unequal, over other force supreme) ; 
Though warring with dread spear the Sea-nymph's son 
Shook Dardan towers, 

As falls a pine beneath the biting steel. 
Or cypress wrenched by Eurus from its root. 
He fell, and wide and far on Trojan dust 
Stamped his great image. 

The false horse, duping, in Minerva's name, 
Lost Trojans mirthful at their feast of death, 
With choral dances blithe in Priam's hall, 
Hid not Achilles. 

His prey, alas ! he slew with open hand ; 
His wrath, alas ! had given to Argive flames 
The harmless infants even within the womb, 
Smiting the unborn. 

Had not the Father of the gods, subdued 
By thee and Venus, with imploring prayer, 



BOOK IV.— ODE VL 373 

Roman Muse. The poet lingers specially on the praise of 
Apollo as the slayer of Achilles ; because, had he who 
spared not the babe in the womb survived, ^neas, an- 
cestor of Augustus, and the Trojan exiles who founded 
the Roman empire, would have perished. Horace, then, 
after a brief reference to Diana, turns, as choragus, to 
address the chorus of the Secular Hymn. 

Carm. VL 

Dive, quem proles Niobea magnae 
Vindicem linguse, Tityosque raptor, 
Sensit, et Trojae prope victor altse 
Phthius Achilles, 

Ceteris major, tibi miles impar ; 
Filius quamvis Thetidis marinas 
Dardanas turres quateret tremenda 
Cuspide pugnax. 

Ille, mordaci velut icta ferro 
Pinus, aut impulsa cupressus Euro, 
Procidit late posuitque collum in 
Pulvere Teucro. 

Ille non inclusus equo Minervae 
Sacra mentito male feriatos 
Troas et laetam Priami choreis 
Falleret aulam ; 

Sed palam captis gravis, heu nefas ! heu ! 
Nescios fari pueros Achivis 
Ureret flammis, etiam latentem 
Matris in alvo ; 

Ni, tuis victus Venerisque gratae 
Vocibus, divum pater annuisset 



374 'THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Pledged to ^neas by his solemn nod 
Walls more auspicious. 

Tuneful Thalia's sovereign melodist, 
Laving in Xanthian waves thy golden hair, 
Support the honour of the Daunian Muse, 
Beardless Agyieus ! * 

Phoebus on me bestowed the soul, on me 
The art of song, on me the poet's name, 
t O noblest virgins, and O ye young sons 
Of noble fathers. 

Wards of the Delian goddess, with her bow 
Striking the flight of stags and lynxes still, 
The Lesbian J measure timed and tuned by me, 
Guard unforgetful, 

Chanting, with ritual due, Latona's son, 
And her who kindles night with crescent beam. 
Prospers the harvests, and the sliding months 
Speeds in their circle. 

Say, maid, then wedded, § " In that hallowed year 
Which did the secular feast-lights reillume. 
Song dear to gods I sang — song taught by him, 
Horace the poet." 



* The name of Agyieus seems here very appropriately invoked, be- 
cause Apollo takes that name from the Greeks, as presiding over the 
thoroughfares of cities, "qviasi viis prgepositus urbanis;" and all the 
streets of Rome would have been alive with the festival and processions 
connected with the Secular Hymn which the ode refers to. 

t Here Horace turns to the chorus of the Secular Hymn. 
X " Lesbium servate pedem, meique 
Pollicis ictum." 
By ''pollicis ictum" is meant the motion of the thumb in marking the 
rhythm or time of the song, not the striking of the lyre. 



BOOK IV.— ODE VI. 375 

Rebus JEne9d potiore ductos 
Alite muros. 

Doctor argutae fidicen Thaliae, 
Phoebe, qui Xantho lavis amne crines, 
Dauniae defende decus Camense, 
Levis Agyieu.'" 

Spiritum Phoebus mihi, Phoebus artem 
Carminis, nomenque dedit poetae. 
Virginum primse, puerique claris 
Patribus orti,t 

DeHae tutela deae, fugaces 
Lyncas et cervos cohibentis arcu, 
Lesbium servate pedem, meique 

PolHcis ictum,J / 

Rite Latonae puerum canentes, 
Rite crescentem face Noctilucam, 
Prosperam frugum, celeremque pronos 
Volvere menses. 

Nupta jam dices : § Ego dis amicum, \ 

Saeculo festas referente luces, \ 

Reddidi carmen, docilis modorum \ 
Vatis Horati. ^ 



§ "Nupta jam dices." Horace here admonishes those who were 
young virgins in the chorus at the date of the Secular Hymn to re- 
member, when wedded wives, their part in the festival, with which he 
associates his name. 



17^ THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE VII. 
TO TORQUATUS. 

The Torquatus here addressed appears to be the same 
Torquatus whom Horace invites to supper, Epist. Lib. I. v. 
Estre, considering there was no ground for Weichert's as- 
sumption that this person was C. Nonius Asprenas Tor- 
quatus, mentioned in Suetonius (in Vit. Augusti), expresses 
his surprise that the commentators had not thought of 

Aulus 

Fled the snows — now the grass has returned to the meadows, 

And their locks to the trees ; 
Now the land's face is changed, dwindled rivers receding 

Glide in calm by their shores. 

Now, unrobed, may the Grace intertwined with her sisters 

Join the dance of the Nymphs. 
" Things immortal, hope not ! " saith the Year — saith the 
Moment 

Stealing off this soft day. 

Winter thaws. Spring has breathed ; quick on Spring tramples 
Summer, 

And is gone to his grave ; 
Appled Autumn his fruits will have shed forth, and then 

Dearth and winter once more. 

But the swift moons'^ restore change and loss in the heavens, 

When we go where have gone 
Sire ^neas, and Tullus,t and opulent Ancus, 

We are dust and a shade. J 

* " Damna tamen celeres reparant cselestia lunae." Macleane ap- 
pears to me right in differing from Orelli, who refers " damna caelestia" 
to the changes of the moon. "'Tamen' shows that the changes and 
deteriorations of the weather and seasons are intended, and ' celeres 
lunae' are the quick-revolving months" — i.e.^ without metaphor, time 



BOOK IV. — ODE VII. 377 

Aulus Torquatus, of whom Nepos speaks in his Life of 
Atticus, c. II, who had served with Brutus and Cassius 
at PhiUppi, and was therefore Horace's old fellow-soldier. 
Macleane considers the poem to be one of Horace's earlier 
odes, and introduced to swell the fasciculus — or, as we 
should say, fill up the volume. I do not see much cause 
for that supposition. The sentiment is one habitual to 
Horace at every stage of his life, and it is in harmony wdth 
the tone of the epistle, published probably five or six years 
before the Fourth Book of Odes. 

Carm. VII. 

Diffugere nives : redeunt jam gramina campis 

Arboribusque comge ; 
Mutat terra vices et decrescentia ripas 

Flumina pr^tereunt ; 

Gratia cum Nyrnphis geminisque sororibus audet 

Ducere nuda choros. 
Immortalia ne speres, monet Annus et aimum 

Quae rapit Hora diem. 

Frigora mitescunt Zephyris, Ver proterit ^stas 

Interitura, simul 
Pomifer Auctumnus fruges effuderit, et mox 

Bruma recurrit iners. 

Damna tamen celeres reparant caelestia lunae ;"^ 

Nos, ubi decidimus, 
Quo pater ^neas, quo Tullus, t dives et Ancus, 

Pulvis et umbra sumus.J. 



brings back the seasons — time does not bring back us men when we 
once vanish. 

+ Ritter has " Tullus, dives et Ancus," not " dives Tullus," observing 
that there is no just cause for calling Tullus rich, whereas the riches 
of Ancus were celebrated. Munro adopts Rittei-'s collocation. 

+ I.e., dust in the tomb, and a shade in Hades. 



3/8 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Who knows if the gods will yet add a to-morrow 

To the sum of to-day ? 
Count as saved from an heir's greedy hands all thou givest 

To that friend — thine own self. 

When once dead, the resplendent'" tribunal of Minos 

Having once pronounced doom, 
Noble birth, suasive tongue, moral worth, O Torquatus, 

Reinstate thee no more. 

Her Hippolytus chaste from the midnight of Hades 

Dian's self could not free ; 
Lethe's chains coiled around his own best-loved Pirithous, 

Theseus' self could not rend. 



* " ' Splendida,' an epithet more proper of the court and tribunal 
than of the judgment (arbitria) given. . . . The choice of p : ?tic figure 
by which to enlarge the simple notion, ' cum semel occideris,' was pro- 
bably suggested by Torquatus's own profession as an advocate, alluded 
to in Ep. I. V. 8, 9." — YoNGE. Ritter takes the epithet as referring to 
the splendour which surrounded the tribunal of Minos, enabling him 
more searchingly to inspect the souls whom he judged ; and observes 
that the splendour is here opposed to " tenebris," line 25. 



BOOK IV. — ODE VII. 379 

Quis scit, an adjiciant hodiernas crastina summse 

Tempora di superi ? 
Cuncta maniis avidas fugient heredis, amico 

Quae dederis animo. 

Cum semel occideris, et de te splendida* Minos 

Fecerit arbitria, 
Non, Torquate, genus, non te facundia, non te 

Restituet pietas ; 

Infemis neque enim tenebris Diana pudicum 

Liberat Hippolytum ; 
Nee Lethaea valet Theseus abrumpere caro 

Vincula Pirithoo. 



380 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE VIIL 

TO CENSORINUS. 

On Stated times, as in the Kalends of March and January, 
it was the custom of the wealthier Romans to make presents 
to their friends. To this custom Horace refers, sending his 
verses to Censorinus, as the most acceptable gift he could 
offer. C. Marcus Censorinus was a man of consular rank, 
bore a high reputation, and died greatly regretted. 

Goblets and bronzes rare, my Censorinus, 

I on my friends would heartily bestow ; 
I'd give them tripods, as Greece gave her heroes — 

Nor should the meanest of my gifts be thine, 
Were I but rich in artful masterpieces 

Such as a Scopas or Parrhasius wrought,'^ 
When one in stone, in liquid hues the other. 

Now fixed a mortal, now enshrined a god. 
Not mine that wealth,t nor do such dainty treasures 

Fail to thine affluence nor allure thy mind ; 
That which charms thee is song : song I can proffer, 

And set a value on the gift I bring. 
Marbles inscribed with a state's grateful praises. 

Wherein great chieftains live and breathe again : 
The flights J of Hannibal, his threats hurled backward. 

And impious Carthage perishing in flames, 
Made not more famed than did Calabrian Muses 

Him who bore off from conquered Africa 
As his own spoils — a Name.§ Nor aught thy guerdon, 

If scrolls be mute upon thy deeds of good. 

* Scopas was a famous sculptor of Paros, according to Pausanias, 
flourishing about 450 years B.C. Parrhasius, a painter, native of Ephe- 
sus, about 400 B.C. He was a contemporary and rival of Zeuxis. 



BOOK IV. — ODE VIII. 381 

Carm. VIII. 

Donarem pateras grataque commodus, 
Censorine, meis aera sodalibus ; 
Donarem tripodas, praemia fortium 
Graiomm ; neque tu pessima munerum 
Ferres, divite me scilicet artium, 
Quas aut Parrhasius protulit, aut Scopas,* 
Hie saxo, liquidis ille coloribus 
Sellers nunc hominem ponere, nunc deum. 
Sed non haec mihi vis ; t non tibi talium 
Res est, aut animus deliciamm egens. 
Gaudes carminibus ; caniiina possumus 
Donare, et pretium dicere muneri. 
Non incisa notis marmora publicis, 
Per quas spiritus et vita redit bonis 
Post mortem ducibus ; non celeres fugae,J 
Reject^que retrorsum Hannibalis minae, 
Non incendia Carthaginis impiae, 
Ejus, qui domita nomen ab Africa § 
Lucratus rediit, clarius indicant 
Laudes, quam Calabrae Pierides : neque, 

+ ** Sed non hgec mihi vis." The sense is approached by our Eng- 
lish idiomatic slang expression, " I am not of that force." 

+ " Celeres fugae" means Hannibal's hasty recall from Italy (Liv. xxx. 
20). — Orelli. 

§ " Scipio Africanus." This passage has given infinite trouble to the 
commentators, Ennius (denoted here by the " Calabrian Muses") cele- 
brated the elder Scipio. But Carthage was burned, not by the elder 
Scipio, but by the younger Scipio Africanus, many years after the death 
of Ennius ; and it cannot be supposed that Horace was so ignorant as to 
ascribe to the elder Scipio the act of the younger. It was even proposed 
by Bentley to omit the seventeenth verse, referring to Carthage, alto- 
gether ; but the line is in all the MSS. extant. Others suggest that two 
lines are wanting after the seventeenth, which would have removed the 
alleged confusion ; and this theory is supported by the assertion that 
odes in this measure are so constituted as to be reducible to stanzas of 



382 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Though son of Mars and Ilia, what — had silence 

Been his worth's cold obstruction — Romulus? 
The genius, favour, voice of powerful poets 

Consecrate ^acus, from waves of Styx 
Ravished to golden isles.* The Muse permits not 

The mortal worthy of her praise to die ; 
Him the Muse hallows to the bliss of heaven. 

Thus in the longed-for banquet-hall of Jove 
Sits resolute Hercules ; the sons of Leda 

Thus — one twin-star — from Ocean's nether deep 
Snatch tempest-shattered barks ; and thus doth Liber, 

His brows adorned with the vine's lusty green. 
Hear as a god our mortal supplications, 

And guide the votive prayer to happy ends. 



four lines each, while this ode wants at present two verses necessary to 
establish that rule. But, as Macleane observes, ' ' the rule itself is arbi- 
trary, and a precarious foundation for such an assumption as the loss of 
two verses, of which no traces are to be found in the oldest MSS. and 
commentators," Macleane thinks "that the confusion is easily seen 
through by those who avoid the commentators and judge for themselves. 
. . . When Horace says that the defeat of Hannibal by the elder 
Scipio, and the destruction of Carthage by the younger, do not hold up 
their name more nobly than the Muse of Calabria, — who does not sup- 
ply, in his own mind, ' which was employed in doing honour to the 
elder ' ? " To me the meaning seems clear enough. Just as Horace, 
Lib. I., Carm. xii. v. 46, makes the name of Marcellus, who took Syra- 
cuse, stand for all his family, and include the young Marcellus, so he 
here makes the name of Africanus stand for the whole family, and in- 
clude especially the younger Scipio. Or, as Ritter expresses it, the 
fame of the elder Scipio, recorded by Ennius, was revived in the destruc- 
tion of Carthage by the younger. 

* " Virtus et favor et lingua potentium 
Vatum divitibus consecrat insulis." 
"'Virtus et favor' are generally taken, like 'lingua,' as belonging to 
'potentium vatum,' so that 'virtus' is 'vis ingenii, facultas poetica.' I 
doubt the accuracy of that interpretation ; I think it rather means that 
though ^acus was virtuous (and he was much celebrated for his justice), 
his virtue would not have raised him to the skies but for the applause 



BOOK IV. — ODE VIII. 383 

Si chartse sileant, quod bene feceris, 
Mercedem tuleris. Quid foret Iliae 
Mavortisque puer, si taciturnitas 
Obstaret meritis invida Romuli ? 
Ereptum Stygiis fluctibus vEacum 
Virtus et favor et lingua potentium 
Vatum divitibus consecrat insulis.^ 
Dignum laude virum Musa vetat mori : 
Caelo Musa beat. Sic Jovis interest 
Optatis epulis impiger Hercules 
Clarum Tyndaridae sidus ab infimis 
Quassas eripiunt aequoribus rates ; 
Ornatus viridi tempora pampino 
Liber vota bonos ducit ad exitus. 



won him by the poets. The causes, therefore, are, his virtue and the 
public esteem ('favor'), and the poet's praise that made his virtue known." 
— Macleane. This interpretation is very ingenious, but as it is op- 
posed to that accepted by the general body of Horatian commentators, 
I do not admit it in translation, though, like all the suggestions of this 
eminent critic, it merits respectful attention. I may add that Ritter 
also separates "virtus" and "favor" from "lingua potentium vatum." 



384 THE ODES OF HORACE. 



ODE IX. 

TO LOLLIUS. 

As the preceding poem was addressed to a man who re- 
tained unblemished a popular reputation to the last, and 
whose death was considered a public calamity, so this poem, 
which equally treats of the immortality it is the gift of poets 
to bestow, is addressed to one who, if we are to take for 
granted such historical records of him as are left, was the 
subject of merited obloquy in his later years, and died by 
poison which he administered to himself, to the great joy of 
his countrymen. And it was for the vices most opposite to 
the special virtues Horace here ascribes to Lollius — viz., for 
rapacity and corruption — that his character, rightly or wrong- 
ly, has been most defamed. His vindication has been, how- 
ever, very ably attempted by Tate (' Vindicise Lollianse'), and 
the evidence against him is generally considered to rest 
upon prejudiced and questionable authority. — See Estre, 

Hor. 

Lest, perchance, thou believe that the words which to music, 
I, whose birth was where Aufidus rushes far-sounding, 
Linked by arts not before me divulged. 
Are but sounds that are fated to die ; 

Remember, that though the first throne be great Homer's, 
There are muses not tuneless, Pindaric and Csean ; 
With Alcaeus, yet threatening and fierce ; 
With Stesichorus, stately and grave. 

Time destroys not what once sported loose in Anacreon ; 
To this day breathes the love, to this day glows the ardour. 
Which the girl of ^olia consigned 
To the strings of her passionate lyre. 



BOOK IV. — ODE IX. 385 

Hor. Pros. At all events it is clear that the vices imputed 
to him by his personal enemy, Sulpicius Quirinus, and Vel- 
leius Paterculus, the adulator of Tiberius, were not sus- 
pected by Augustus, with whom, even after his defeat by 
the Sygambri, a.u.c. 737, he retained eminent favour and 
influence, and who subsequently appointed him tutor to his 
grandson, Caius Caesar. If Lollius could deceive Augustus 
as to his real nature, it has been shrewdly observed that he 
might well deceive Horace. The exact date of the ode is 
unknown, but it has the appearance of being written after 
Lollius's defeat and recall ; at all events, it was published 
not long after it, and is therefore an evidence of Horace's 
generous desire to soothe and sustain his friend in a time 
of reverse, and, no doubt, of unpopularity. The latter part 
of the poem is in Horace's noblest style of sentiment and 
expression. Ritter maintains that Epistles ii. and xviii.. 
Lib. I., are addressed to the LolHus of the ode ; but most 
critics consider them to be addressed to his eldest son. 



Carm. IX. 

Ne forte credas interitura, quae 
Longe sonantem natus ad Aufidum, 
Non ante volgatas per artes 
Verba loquor socianda chordis 

Non, si priores Maeonius tenet 
Sedes Homerus, Pindaricae latent, 
Ceaeque, et Alcaei minaces, 

Stesichorique graves Camenae ; 

Nee, si quid olim lusit Anacreon, -— 
Delevit aetas ; spirat adhuc amor, 
Vivuntque commissi calores 
^oliae fidibus puellae. 

2 B 



386 THE ODES OF HORACE. " 

Spartan Helen was not the sole woman inflamed by 
An adulterer's sleek locks ; or seduced by the glitter 
Of the vestments embroidered in gold, 
And the graces and pomp of a prince; 

Teucer bent not the first skilful bow of the Cretan ; 
Troy was more than once harassed by valiant besiegers ; 
Other chiefs, besides Sthenelus strong. 
Or Idomeneus mighty, achieved 

Deeds as worthy as theirs of a Muse to record them ; 
Not the first was Deiphobus keen, or fierce Hector, 
Who has met, without flinching, the blow, 
In defence of his children and wife. 

Many brave men have lived long before Agamemnon, 
But o'er them darkly presses the slumber eternal ; 
All unwept and unknown, wanting Him — 
Everlastingly sacred — the Bard ! 

Little differs worth hidden from worthlessness buried ; 
In the page I shall speak, and the page shall adorn thee ; 
I will let not, O Lollius, thy toils 
Fade in livid oblivion away. 

In thy mind thou conjoinest life's practical knowledge, 
And a temper unmoved by the changes of fortune,* 
Whatsoever her smile or her frown. 
Neither bowed nor elate, — but erect; 

The avenger of greedy and fraudful Corruption, 
The abstainer from Gold, which draws all to its magnet — 
Consul not of the one year alone. 

For thy mind must be always in power 

*■ " Secundis 
Temporibus dubiisque rectus." 
I agree with Orelli and Macleaiie in thinking these lines refer to the de- 



. BOOK IV. — ODE IX. 387 

Non sola comptos arsit adulter! 
Crines, et aurum vestibus illitum 

Mirata, regalesque cultus 

" Et comites Helene Lacaena ; 

Primusve Teucer tela Cydonio 
Direxit arcu ; non semel Ilios 
Vexata ; non pugnavit ingens 
Idomeneus Sthenelusve solus 

Dicenda Musis proelia ; non ferox 
Hector, vel acer Deiphobus graves 
Excepit ictus pro pudicis 

Conjugibus puerisque primus. 

Vixere fortes ante Agamemnona 
Multi ; sed omnes illacrimabiles 
Urgentur ignotique longa 

Nocte, carent quia vate sacro. 

Paullum sepultse distat inertias 
Celata virtus. Non ego te meis 
Chartis inornatum silebo, 
Totve tuos patiar labores 

Impune, LoUi, carpere lividas 
Obliviones. Est animus tibi 
Eerumque prudens, et secundis 
Temporibus dubiisque rectus;* 

Vindex avarae fraudis, et abstinens 
Ducentis ad se cuncta pecuniae ; 

Consulque non unius anni, ' 

Sed quoties bonus atque fidus 



feat of Lollius in Germany; and it seems that not only Horace here em- 
phatically seeks to pay tribute to the steadfastness and integrity of his 
friend's character, but in the concluding stanza to vindicate his courage, 
and intimate that he was the last man who would have feared death. 



388 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Whensoever an arbiter, faithful to justice, 
Over what is expedient exalts what is honest, 
Awes the briber with one lofty look, 

And through hosts clears, victorious, his way."^ 

It is not large possessions themselves that are blessings ; 
More rightly called " blest," he whose claim to the title 
Is the wisdom which puts to their use 
All the gifts that he owes to the gods. 

He who hardens his soul to reverse and privation — 
He who looks upon death as less dread than dishonour- 
Never fears, for the friends of his love 
Or the cause of his country, to die. 



* The meaning of these lines seems explained by reference to Lib. HI. 
Od. ii. lines 19, 20, — 

. " Nee sumit aut ponit secures 
Arbitrio popularis aurse ;" 

i.e., Lollius is not the mere ofificial consul of a single year — he never lays 
down the insignia of his majestic virtue. It seems to me that the image 
is still continued through the lines, — 

" Per obstantes catervas 
Explicuit sua victor arma." 

The lictors dispersed opposing crowds to make way for the consul ; and 
"arma" here may signify their axes. Yonge renders the passage yet 
more symbolically, in this eloquent paraphrase : "The soul has an inde- 
pendent dignity so long as, true in principle and judgment, it rejects cor- 
ruption, and bursts in a moral victory through the host of vices." Rit- 
ter insists on construing the lines literally, and refers them to Lollius's 
military administration of his province. 



BOOK IV.— ODE IX. 389 

Judex honestum praetulit iitili, 
Rejecit alto dona nocentium 
Voltu, per obstantes catervas 
Explicuit sua victor arma.* 

Non possidentem multa vocaveris 
Recte beatum : rectius occupat 
Nomen beati, qui deorum 
Muneribus sapienter uti, 

Duramque callet pauperiem pati, 
Pej usque leto flagitium timet; 
Non ille pro caris amicis 
Aut patria timidus perire. 



ODE X. Omitted. 



399 THE ODES QF HORACE. 



ODE XL 



TO PHYLLIS. 



As Horace had before (Lib. IIL Od. xxviii.) invited Lyde 
to the feast-day of Neptune, so he here invites Phylhs to cele- 
brate the birthday of Maecenas in the Ides of April. The date 
of the ode cannot be determined, though it may be reasonably 
conjectured that when he speaks of Phyllis as his last love, 
he was of an age correspondent with the period at which the 
Fourth Book was published. Nevertheless this is no sure in- 
dex; for, as Macleane shrewdly intimates, most men promise 
the women they woo that she shall be the last love. To those 
who insist upon giving literal individual personality to the 
fictitious names Horace introduces into his poems, this poem 
would seem written at a much earlier period, since Telephus, 
that universal ladykiller, is still described as '' juvenis." But 
we have already seen that "juvenis" by no means necessar- 
ily signifies a youth. I do not believe, with Macleane, that 

Telephus 

I've a cask of rich Alban wine full in my cellar — 
It has passed its ninth year ; in my garden, fair Phyllis, 
There is parsley for chaplets, and O, in profusion. 
Ivy too, ivy. 

Thou art dazzling whenever that binds up thy tresses. 

All my house laughs with plate ; clasped around with chaste 

vervain, 
Lo, mine altar stands thirsting the blood of a lambkin 
Soon to be sprinkled. 

And all hands are at work ; here and there run the servants. 
Men and maids, helter-skelter ; the flame mounts in flicker, 



. BOOK IV. — ODE XL 39 1 

Telephus is altogether a poetic fiction ; neither am I satis- 
fied with the grounds upon which Ritter identifies the 
Telephus of Ode xiii. Book I., and xix. Book III., with 
Heliodorus, the grammarian and Greek scholar mentioned 
Serm. i. 5, 2, and assumes that another person is designated 
under that name in this ode. Nothing is more likely than 
that among Horace's gayer companions there was some one 
very good-looking gallant, celebrated for his bo7mes fortunes 
among the freedwomen of Rome, whom the poet always 
designates under the name of Telephus. It is observable 
that there is considerable consistency in the way in which 
Telephus is mentioned in Horace, with a good-humoured, 
half-envious admiration for personal gifts, and whom, on the 
single occasion (Carm. xix. Lib. IH.) in which the hand- 
some gentleman seems disposed to bore with an unseason- 
able display of learning, he puts back into his right place 
as reveller and gallant, with a certain superiority, such as, 
when it came to a display of learning, a Horace might be 
disposed to assume towards a Telephus. 

Carm. XI. 

Est mihi nonum superantis annum 
Plenus Albani cadus ; est in horto, 
Phylli, nectendis apium coronis ; 
Est hederas vis 

Multa, qua crines religata fulges ; 
Ridet argento domus ; ara castis 
Vincta verbenis avet immolato 
Spargier agno ; 

Cuncta festinat manus, hue et illuc 
Cursitant mixtae pueris puellse ; 



392 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

As it whirls the smoke cresting the point of its summit 
Round and around it'"^ 

But that now thou mayst know to what mirth I invite thee, 
'Tis in honour of Ides, not ungrateful to Phyllis, 
'Tis the day that halves April, sweet month in which Venus 
Rose out of ocean ; 

Day, indeed, that by me should be solemnised duly — 
Scarce mine own natal day I hold equally sacred, 
Since it is by its light, year on year, my Maecenas 
Sums up life's riches. 

Come, that Telephus whom thou art seeking (poor Phyllis ! 
He's a youth above thee) is now chained to another. 
She is wanton and rich, and she holds him in bondage. 
Pleased with his fetters. 

Phaethon, burnt in his chariot, deters from ambition, 
AVinged Pegasus spurning Bellerophon earth-born 
May admonish thee also by this solemn lesson, 
" Seek but what suits thee ;" 

Deeming Hope, when it flies out of reach, is unlawful, 
O set not thy heart where the lots are unequal. 
Come, with me be contented, of all loves my latest ; 
Love with, thee endeth. 

After thee never more woman's face shall inflame me ; 

O, be cheered, then, and come ; let me teach thee such 

measures 
As the voice which I love into sweetness shall render ; 
Song lessens sorrow. 

* *' Sordidum flammse trepidant rotantes 
Vertice fumum." 
" 'Vertice ' is the top of the flame, which flickers as it whirls the dark 
smoke on its crest — a spiral flame, culminating in a column of smoke. 
It seems as if Horace were writing with a fire burning before him, and 
caught the idea as he wrote." — Macleane. 



BOOK IV. — ODE XL 393 

Sordidum flammag trepidant rotantes 

Venice fumum.* 

Ut tamen noris, quibus advoceris 
Gaudiis, Idus tibi sunt agendae, 
Qui dies mensem Veneris marinae 
Findit Aprilem ; 

Jure soUemnis mihi, sanctiorque, 
Pasne natali proprio, quod ex hac 
Luce Maecenas mens adfluentes 
Ordinat annos. 

Telephum, quem tu petis, occupavit, 
Non tuae sortis juvenem, puella 
Dives et lasciva, tenetque grata 
Compede vinctum. 

Terret ambustus Phaethon avaras 
Spes ; et exemplum grave prasbet ales 
Pegasus, terrenum equitem gravatus 
Bellerophontem ; 

Semper ut te digna sequare, et ultra 
Quam licet sperare nefas putando 
Disparem vites. Age jam, meorm 
Finis amorum, 

Non enim posthac alia calebo 
Femina, — condisce modos, amanda 
Voce quos reddas ; minuentur atras 
Carmine curse. 



394 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

- ODE XIL 

INVITATION TO VIRGIL. 

It is a vexed question among commentators whether the 
Virgil here addressed be Virgil the poet. Yonge says that 
the general authority of critics is against that identification. 
Macleane is disposed to favour it, and it is not without other 
and very eminent defenders. 

The main objections to the assumption are — ist, the 
chronological one. Virgil was dead many years before the 
publication of the Fourth Book ; but, in answer to this, it is 
said that, in making up the collection composed for Book 
IV., Horace might have included poems composed at a 
much earlier date. Dillenburger considers that this ode was 
written in youth, and published in the final book of the 
Odes, as if Horace wished to refresh and record the memory 
of his friend. 

2d, It is asked, " How can Virgil the poet be called 
the client of noble youths ? " To this it has been replied, 
that the youths referred to might be the stepsons of Augus- 
tus, or (more generally by Dillenburger), that the phrase 
means nothing more than the familiarity with persons of 
high station, such as Agrippa, Pollio, and others. 

3d, That an injunction to lay aside the care or study of 
gain (studium lucri) is very inappropriate to the liberal and 
generous character assigned to the poet. But here again it 
is said, that it is absurd to take literally what is obviously 
written in jest. If a man, the most indifferent to gain, had, 
for instance, informed us that he thought he could sell an 

olive 

Now Thracian breezes, comrades of the spring, 
Temper the ocean and impel the sails ; 
Frost crisps not now the fields, nor rage the floods, 
Swollen with winter snows. 



, BOOK IV. — ODE XII. 395 

olive crop well, or that he had found a good investment for 
his money, we might very well say to him, " Put aside those 
mercenary thoughts of gain, and come and sup with us." 
There would be at once a jest and a compliment in the 
irony of the implied accusation. That the Virgil addressed 
must be a vender of perfumes, because he is asked to con- 
tribute a pot of nard ; or a banker or negotiator, because he 
is exhorted to put aside the care of gain — and a scholiast in 
a Paris MS. inscribes the ode, " Ad Virgilium Negotiator- 
em," — is a conjecture less plausible than that he was a physi- 
cian of that name to the Neros, or a relation of C. Virgil 
the pr^tor, Cicero's friend. 

Orelli and Yonge quote with approval Gesner's remark, 
" That there is nothing in the poem itself which pertains 
more to the poet Virgil than to any other friend of Horace's." 
On the other hand, it has been said that the mythological 
imagery and the description of Spring with which the poem 
opens, are addressed with appropriate felicity to the Poet of 
the Eclogues and Georgics. 

The question does not seem to admit of positive solution 
one way or the other. The reader must judge for himself 
whether it is probable that Horace included in theFourth 
Book a poem that, if addressed to Virgil the poet, he must 
have written many years before ; and whether if he did thus, 
as Dillenburger contends, seek to revive the memory of his 
early friend, it would have been in a poem of a compara- 
tively light character, and so wholly free from any reference 
to the loss he had sustained. 

Carm. xn. 

Jam Veris comites, quae mare temperant, 
Impellunt animae lintea Thraciae ; 
Jam nee prata rigent nee fluvii strepunt 
Hiberna nive turgidi. 



39^ THE ODES OF HORACE, 

Now builds her nest the melancholy bird 
Yet moaning Itys ; she, the eternal shame 
Of Cecrops' house for vengeance too severe 
On barbarous lusts of kings.* 

Swains of sleek flocks on the young grass reclined, 
Chant pastoral songs attuned to piping reeds, 
Charming the god who loves the darksome slopes 
And folds of Arcady ; 

These, O my Virgil, are the days of thirst -, 
But if, O client of illustrious youths, 
Calenian juices tempt, bring thou the nard. 
And with it earn my wine ; 

One tiny box of spikenard will draw forth 
The cask now ripening in Sulpician t vaults, — 
Cask large enough to hold a world of hope, 
And drown a world of care. 

Quick ! if such merriments delight thee, come 
With thine own contributions to the feast ; 
Not like rich host in prodigal halls — my cups 
Thou shalt not tinge scot-free. 

But put aside delays and care of gain. 
Warned, while yet time, by the dark death-fires ; mix 
With thought brief thoughtlessness ; to be unwise 
In time and place is sweet. 

■* " Quod male barbaras, 
Regum est ulta libidines." 
Most authorities, Orelli amongst them, take "male" with *'ulta" — 
viz., that the bird, whether Philomela or Procne, avenged too cruelly 
(nimis atrociter) the guilt of Tereus. I have translated accordingly, 
but am by no means sure that **male" should not be taken, as 
Macleane suggests, with *' barbaras" — viz., the too barbarous, or evilly 
barbarous, lusts of kings. The bird is the eternal reproach to the house 
of Cecrops, not on account of the severity of her vengeance, but on ac 



BOOK IV.— ODE XII. 397 

Nidum ponit, Ityn flebiliter gemens, 
Infelix avis et Cecropiae domus 
Sternum opprobrium, quod male barbaras 
Regum est ulta libidines.*" 

Dicunt in tenero gramine pinguium 
Custodes ovium carmina fistula, 
Delectantque deum, cui pecus et nigri 
Colles Arcadise placent. 

Adduxere sitim tempora, Virgili ; 
Sed pressum Calibus ducere Liberum 
Si gestis, juvenum nobilium cliens, 
Nardo vina merebere. 

Nardi parvus onyx eliciet cadum, 
Qui nunc Sulpiciis accubat horreis,''' 
Spes donare novas largus, amaraque 
Curarum eluere efficax. 

Ad quae si properas gudia, cum tua 
Velox merce veni : non ego te meis 
Immunem meditor tingere poculis, 
Plena dives ut in domo. 

Verum pone moras et studium lucri, 
Nigrorumque memor, dum licet, ignium, 
Misce stultitiam consiliis brevem : 
Dulce est desipere in loco. 

count of the atrocity of the crimes she avenged. Most commentators of 
authority agree that the bird here meant is the swallow, not nightin- 
gale. Ritter understands by "flebiliter" the swallow's inarticulate twitter, 
t "Sulpiciis horreis." The Sulpician wine-vaults were famous, and 
the scholiast Porphyrion says they were still the great magazines for 
wine and oil in his day, under the name of the Galban cellars. Ritter 
considers that Orelli is mistaken in supposing that Horace intimates 
that he will buy the wine there ; and maintains that he refers to his own 
cask, which had been warehoused in the Sulpician magazine. 



3g8 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIII. 

TO LYCE, A FADED BEAUTY. 

No subject of inquiry can be less interesting to a critic of 
good sense than that on which so many learned disputants 
have wasted their time — viz., who among the ladies cele- 
brated by Horace were real persons or imaginary ; and who 
are to be admitted into or rejected from the genuine cata- 
logue of his loves? We have absolutely no data to go 
upon. There is no reason, except that he chooses to apply 
the same name to both, to suppose that the Lyce over whose 
ruined charms he now exults was the Lyce of whose cruelty 
he complains. Lib. HI. Od. x. ; nay, I believe that most 
recent scholars are pretty well agreed that the ode last 
mentioned was an artistic exercise, imitated from the Greek 

serenades. 

They have heard my prayers, Lyce, the gods ; 
The gods have heard, Lyce ; thou'rt old, 
Yet still, setting up for a beauty, 

Thou wouldst tipple and frisk with the young ; 

Courting, maudlin, with tremulous chant, 
Laggard Cupid : he's absent on guard 

O'er the bloom on the cheeks of young Chia, 
Whose lute is more sweet than thy song.'^ 

For he roosts not on oaks without sap ; 
Hollow teeth and dry wrinkles he flies, 

He is chilled by the snow of grey tresses, 
And thus has retreated from thee. 



* There is an opposition between Lyce's tremulous quaver, "cantu 
tremulo," and Chia's musical skill, " doctae psallere," which can only, 
perhaps, be made clear by some slight paraphrase, as is attempted in the 
last line of the stanza, in translation. 



BOOK IV. — ODE XIII. 399 

serenades. But, so far as mere conjecture from internal 
evidence may be allowed, the present ode seems to have 
in it a tone of earnestness which warrants a belief that the 
Lyce addressed was a real person. In the three conclud- 
ing stanzas, the bitterness of sarcasm is tinged with a certain 
melancholy pathos which appears to indicate the memory 
of a former passion ; and the direct reference to Cinara — 
to whom all interpreters agree in considering Horace was 
attached (whether or not he celebrates her under names of 
the same metrical quantity, Lalage, Glycera, &c.) — gives a 
peculiar air of individual truthfulness to the poem. Be this 
as it may, the ode is remarkable for its eternal applicability 
to a type in female character, and is replete with beauties 
of expression. The image in the last stanza is extremely 
striking. The simile is so simple that one might fancy it 
would have occurred to any poet, yet it is so expressed as 
to be quite original. 



Carm. XIII. 

Audivere, Lyce, di mea vota, di 
Audivere, Lyce ; fis anus, et tamen 
Vis formosa videri, 

Ludisque et bibis impudens, 

Et cantu tremulo pota Cupidinem 
Lentum sollicitas. Ille virentis et 
Doctas psallere Chise 

Pulchris excubat in gen is.* 

Importunus enim transvolat aridas 
Quercus, et refugit te, quia luridi 
Dentes, te quia rugae 
Turpant et capitis nives. 



400 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Sparkling gems, and the purples of Cos,* 
Cannot back to thee bring the dead years 
Rapid Time has interred in our annals, 
For all men to number their graves. t 

Whither fled is the beauty ? alas ! 
Where the bloom ? where the movement of grace ? 
Of that — O of that — what is left thee. 

Breathing loves, which stole me from myself. 

Blest successor to Cinara thou, 
Gracious form, J for arts pleasing renowned ? 
But to Cinara few years were conceded, 
By the Fates who have Lyce preserved 

To be rival in age to the crow. 
That the young, glowing yet, may behold, 
As a subject of mirth, in those ashes 
The fallen remains of a torch. 

* Horace speaks of the robes from Cos in Sat. I. ii. line lOO, as so 
transparent that they left nothing to conceal. 

t ' ' Tempora, qnse semel 
Notis condita fastis 
Inclusit volvicris dies." 
" Horace means to say that the days she has seen are all buried, as it 
were, in the grave of the public annals (as Acron says), and there any 
one may find them, but she cannot get them back. It is a graphic way 
of identifying the years, and marking their decease, to point to the 
record in which each is distinguished by its consuls and its leading 
events. ' Notis ' merely expresses the publicity and notoriety of the 
record by which the lapse of time is marked." — Macleane. 
X "Notaque et artium 
Gratamm facies ? " 
" 'Facies' does not mean the face alone, but the whole form and 
presence. 'Facies autem totam corporis speciem significat.' " — DlL- 
LENBURGER. See, too, Orelli's note. 



BOOK IV. — ODE XIII. 401 

Nee Cose refenint jam tibi purpurae,"' 
Nee elari lapides tempora, quae semel 
Notis condita fastis 
Inclusit volucris dies.t 

Quo fugit Venus ? heu, quove eolor ? decens 
Quo motus ? quid habes illius, illius, 
Quae spirabat Amores, 
Quae me surpuerat mihi, 

Felix post Cinaram, notaque et artium 
Gratarum faeies ? j Sed Cinarae breves 
Annos fata dederunt, 
Servatura diu parem 

Cornicis vetulse temporibus Lycen ; 
Possent ut juvenes visere fervidi, 
Multo non sine risu, 

Dilapsam in cineres facem. 



2 c 



402 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XIV. 

TO AUGUSTUS, AFTER THE VICTORIES OF TIBERIUS. 

The introduction to Ode iv. in this book has, sufficiently 
for the purpose, sketched the outHne of the events which led 
to the composition of this ode. As the former was devoted 

to 

By what care can the Senate of Rome, and Rome's people, 
With a largess of honours sufficiently ample, 
By what titles, what archives to time. 
Eternise thy virtues, Augustus, 

Prince supremest, wherever the sun lights a region 
That man can inhabit ? What in war thou availest. 
The Vindelici lately have learned, 

Free till then from the law of the Roman. 

By no even exchange in the barter of bloodshed,'" 
Drusus, leading thy hosts, overthrew the fleet Breuni — 
The Genauni — implacable race — 
And the citadels piled upon Alps 

Horror-breathing ; then Nero the elder completed 
Glories due to thine auspice in one crowning battle ; 
Closed the raid of the savage, and crushed 
The grim might of the giant-like Rasti. 

All conspicuous he rode where the fight raged the fiercest, 
Wasting down, to what wrecks ! that array of stern bosoms. 
Self-surrendered as offerings to death, 
In the stubborn devotion to freedom. 

Through the foe went his way, as the blast o'er the billows 
When the Pleiads are cleaving the rain-clouds asunder, 

* "Plus vice simplici." This does not mean "more than once," but, 
as the scholiasts interpret, "with double loss to the enemy j" or lite- 



. BOOK IV.— ODE XIV. 4O3 

to the praises of Dmsus, so the latter commemorates the sub- 
sequent and completing conquests of Tiberius, and refers all 
to the honour of Augustus in the establishment of his empire, 
and the consummation of his fortunes and his glory. 

Carm. XIV. 

Quae cura Patrum, quaeve Quiritium, 
Plenis honorum muneribus tuas, 
Auguste, virtutes in aevum 

Per titulos memoresque fastos 

^^ternet, O, qua sol habitabiles 
Illustrat oras, maxime principum ? 
Quem legis expertes Latinae, 
Vindelici didicere nuper, 

Quid Marte posses. MiHte nam tuo 
Drusus Genaunos, implacidum genus, 
Breunosque veloces, et arces 
Alpibus impositas tremendis, 

Dejecit acer plus vice simplici;'^ 
Major Neronum mox grave proelium 
Commisit, immanesque Rsetos 
Auspiciis pepulit secundis : 

Spectandus in certamine Martio, 
Devota morti pectora liberie 
Quantis fatigaret minis ; 

Indomitas prope qualis undas 

Exercet Auster, Pleiadum choro 
Scindente nubes, impiger hostium 



rally, as Macleane renders it, "with more than an even exchange" — 
i.e,^ of bloocL - 



404 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

And the snort of his war-horse was heard 
In the midst of the lightnings of battle.* 

As when Aufidus, laving the kingdoms of Daunus, 
Bursts in wrath, and in form of the wild bull,t his borders, 
And prepares the dread deluge he drives 

O'er the fields that are rife with the harvest, — 

So in storm, through that barbarous array swept the Nero, 
Mowing, foremost to hindmost, ranks serried in iron, 
Till a victor he stood, without loss. 

On a ground that was strewn with the foemen ; 

But he owed to thyself the resources, the counsels, 
And the gods. From the day that her gates and void palace, 
Suppliant Egypt threw open to thee. 

Had thy reign reached its third happy lustre, 

When, in crowning thy wish and completing thy glory. 
Fortune ended the wars which her favour had prospered, J 
And established in triumph the peace 
Of a world underneath thy dominion. 

Thee the dauntless Cantabrian, before never conquered ; 
Thee the Mede and the Indian, and Scyth, the wild Nomad, 
Mark in wonder and awe, guardian shield 
Of Italia, and Rome the earth's mistress. 

Thee the Nile, unrevealing the source of its waters ; 
Thee the Danube ; and thee the swift rush of the Tigris ; 

* "Medios per ignes" — i.e., "per medium ardorem belli" (Com. 
Cruq.) 

\ " Tauriformis Aufidus;" literally, **tauriform" or "bull-formed 
Aufidus." The image is applied to many rivers by the Greek and 
Latin poets. Macleane suggests that the branches of so many large 
streams at the mouths of rivers might have suggested the idea of the 
horns ; but it seems to me that the comparison to the bull in generai 
applies to the blind and senseless violence of the animal, who runs on 



BOOK IV.— ODE XIV. 405 

Vexare turmas, et frementem 

Mittere equum medios per ignes.* 

Sic tauriformis volvitur Aufidus,+ 
Qui regna Dauni praefluit Apuli, 
Cum saevit, horrendamque cultis 
Diluviem meditatur agris, 

Ut barbarorum Claudius agmina 
Ferrata vasto diruit impetu, 

Primosque et extremes metendo 
Stra\'it humum, sine clade victor, 

Te copias, te consilium et tuos 
Prsebente divos. Nam tibi, quo die 
Portus Alexandrea supplex 
Et vacuam patefecit aulam, 

Fortuna lustro prospera tertio 
Belli secundos reddidit exitus, J 
Laudemque et optatum peractis 
Imperils decus arrogavit. 

Te Cantaber non ante domabilis, 
Medusque, et Indus, te profugus Scythes 
Jvliratur, O tutela prssens 
Italiae dominaeque Romse : 

Te, fontium qui celat origines 
Nilusque et Ister, te rapidus Tigris, 



indiscriminately, trampling and destrojing everything in his way — jusl 
as the inundation of a torrent does. 

Z Horace, here addressing Augustus, ascribes it to him as his crown- 
ing victory that he has at last got the wish of his heart, which was 
peace — the peace of the world, subjected to the Roman Empire, The 
victory of Tiberius was on the fifteenth anniversary of the day on which 
Augustus entered Alexandria, and, thus terminating the civil war, be- 
came supreme. 



406 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Thee the monster-fraught ocean, which roars 
Round the birthplace remote of the Briton ; 

Thee fierce Gallia, the land for which death has no terror. 
Thee Iberia, the stubborn, hear hushed and submissive ; 
The Sygambri, exulting in gore, 

With meek arms piled in trophy, adore thee. 



BOOK IV. — ODE XIV. 407 

Te beluosus qui remotis 

Obstrepit Oceanus Britannis ; 

Te non paventis funera Galliae 
Durseque tellus audit Hiberiae ; 
Te caede gaudentes Sygambri 
Compositis venerantur armis. 



408 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

ODE XV. 

TO AUGUSTUS ON THE RESTORATION OF PEACE. 

This ode is the appropriate epilogue to the Fourth Book, 
of which the poems that celebrate the Roman victories under 
Drusus and Tiberius consitute the noblest portion. If it be 
true that the book was published on account of these odes, 
and at the desire of Augustus, Horace would naturally con- 
clude by a special reference to the beneficial issues of the 
wars undertaken by Augustus, and from the final completion 
of which in Gaul, Germany, and Spain, he had just returned 
to Rome. Horace here begins by saying, that when he 

wished 

Of wars and vanquished cities when I longed 
To sing, Apollo checked me with his lyre, 
Lest I launched sails so slight 

Into so vast a deep. Caesar, thy reign 

Has given back golden harvests to our fields ; 
Our standards, torn from Parthia's haughty walls, 
Restored to Roman Jove ; 

Closed gates of Janus, vacant of a war ; 

To righteous order rampant licence curbed. 
Thrust from the state the vices'" which defiled, 
And, in their stead, recalled 

The ancient virtues to their fatherland, t — 



* " Emovitqiie culpas. " This refers to the moral reforms undertaken 
by Augustus, such as the Julian law, "de adulteriis et de pudicitia." 

f " ' Veteres artes.' 'Artes' here means 'virtues,' as in Book III. 
Od. iii. ' Hac arte' (aperTj), as prudence, fortitude, justice, temperance." 
— ACRON. 



BOOK IV. — ODE XV. 409 

wished to sing of those wars, Phoebus checked him. But 
Phoebus does not forbid him to sing the triumphs of peace ; 
and, with a lively lyrical abruptness, he therefore at once 
bursts forth : — 

"Tua, Csesar, setas 
Fruges et agris retvilit uberes," &c 

That the poem was composed immediately after the return 
of Caesar, and in connection with Odes iv. and xiv., is, I 
think, made clear by its OAvn internal evidence. War is 
finished, and Augustus is celebrated as the triumphant 
establisher of law and order, and the author of the na- 
tional prosperity, and the improvements, social and moral, 
which result from the security to life and property bestowed 
by a government at once firm and beneficent. He is here 
the descendant, not of Mars and Ilia, but of Anchises and 
Venus the gentle. 



Carm. XV. 

Phoebus volentem proelia me loqui 
Victas et urbes, increpuit lyra ; 
Ne parva Tyrrhenum per ^quor 
Vela darem. Tua, Caesar, aetas 

Fruges et agris retulit uberes, 
Et signa nostro restituit Jovi, 
Derepta Parthorum superbis 
Postibus, et vacuum duellis 



Janum Quirini clausit, et ordinem 
Rectum evaganti frena Licentiae 
Injecit, emovitque culpas,* 
Et veteres revocavit artes,t 



419 THE ODES OF HORACE. 

Virtues from which have grown the Roman name, 
Italia's might, fame, and majestic sway. 
To the Sun's Orient rise. 

From his calm bed in our Hesperian seas. 

Caesar our guardian, neither civil rage ^ 
Nor felon violence scares us from repose. 
Nor ire which sharpens swords. 

And makes the wars of nations and their woes. 

Neither the drinkers of deep Danube break 
The Julian Laws, nor Scyths, nor Seres fierce, 
Nor Persia's faithless sons, 

Nor wild men cradled on the banks of Don. 

So, with each sacred, with each common day 
(Prayer, as is due, first rendered to the gods), 
'Mid blithesome Liber's boons. 

Gathering our women and our children round, 

Let us, as did our fathers in old time, 
Honour with hymns and Lydian fife brave chiefs : 
Sing Troy ; Anchises sing ; 

Sing of the race from gentle Venus sprung. 



* " Non furor 
Civilis aut vis exiget otium, 
Non ira, quae procudit enses, 
Et miseras inimicat urbes. " 
Three causes of fear are removed : ** Furor civilis," "civil war ;' 
" personal violence ;" "ira," " foreign wars. " 



BOOK IV. — ODE XV. 4I I 

Per quas Latinum nomen et Italae 
Crevere vires, famaque et imperi 
Porrecta majestas ad ortus 
Solis ab Hesperio cubili. 

Custode remm Csesare, non furor 
Civilis aut vis exiget otium, 
Non ira, quae procudit enses, 
Et miseras inimicat urbes. "' 

Non, qui profundum Danubium bibunt, 
Edicta rumpent Julia, non Getse, 
Non Seres, infidive Persse, 

Non Tanain prope flumen orti. 

Nosque et profestis lucibus et sacris. 
Inter jocosi munera Liberi, 

Cum prole matronisque nostris. 
Rite deos prius apprecati, 

Virtute functos, more patrum, duces, 
Lydis remixto carmine tibiis, 
Trojamque et Anchisen et alm^ 
Progeniem Veneris can emus. 



I 



THE EPODES 



414 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Orelli, Dillenbiirger, and Macleane concur in accepting 
Franke's date for the publication of the book of Epodes — ■ 
viz., A.U.C. 724, when Horace was thirty-five years old. The 
poems contained in the book appear to have been written 
between 713 and the date at which they were published; 
and, no doubt, many of them were known to Horace's 
friends before publication. It is to these Epodes that 
Horace refers in the boast, Epist. i. 19-23, that " He first 
introduced the Parian iambics, following the numbers and 
the spirit of Archilochus" (of Paros). Their title of Epode 
was not given to them (any more than that of Ode was given 
to the poems classed under that name) by Horace himself 
Such designations are the inventions of some long-subse- 
quent grammarian. 

These poems are not lyrical in point of form, though they 
are occasionally so in point of spirit — especially, I think, 
the 13th Epode. They serve as an intermediate link between 
Horace's Odes and his earlier Satires. 

The first ten Epodes are all in the same metre^altemate 
trimeter and dimeter iambics ; they admit spondees only in 
the uneven places, and there is but one instance (ii. 35) in 
which an anapaest is admitted. 

In the translation, the metre selected for the more im- 



INTRODUCTION. 415 

portant of these Epodes has been employed in the version 
of a few of the graver odes — viz., the ordinary form of 
blank verse converted into a couplet by alternate tennina- 
tions in a dissyllable and monosyllable. 

In the lighter of these first ten Epodes — viz., Ep. vi. x. — I 
have thought that the variation of a more easy and rapid 
measure was necessary to represent the lively spirit of the 
Latin. 



41 6 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 



EPODE I. 

TO M^CENAS. 

This epode is generally supposed to have been composed 
when Augustus had summoned the leading public men, 
whether senators or equites, to meet him at Brundusium 
prior to the expedition against Antony and Cleopatra which 
resulted in the battle of Actium, a.u.c. 723. The poem war- 
rants the assumption that Maecenas had been then appointed 
to, or offered, a naval command; but it seems (Dio. 51, 3, 
and Seneca, Ep. 114, 6) that Augustus decided on retaining 

him 

So thou wilt go with thy Libumian galleys, 

Amongst, O friend, those giant floating towers ; 
Prepared to share all perils braved by Caesar, 

And ward them off, M^cenas, by thine own. 
But what of us, to whom, while thou survivest. 

Life is a joy ; — thee lost, a weary load? 
Shall we, as bidden, take our ease contented ? 

Ease has no sweetness if not shared with thee ; 
Or shall we bear our part in thy great labour 

As fitting men of no unmanly mould ? 
Yes, we would bear; and thee o'er Alpine summits. 

Or through the wastes of guestless Caucasus, 
Or where the last pale rim of the horizon 

Fades on the farthest waters of the west, 
Follow with soul undaunted. Dost thou ask me 

How, weak in body, and unskilled in war, 
My toil could lighten thine ? I should be present 

With terrors less than those the absent know ; 
Even as the bird more dreads for her young nestlings, 

If for a moment left, the gliding snake ; 



EPODE I. 417 

him at home to watch over the affairs of Italy, and maintain 
order at Rome. Mr Dyer, in the ' Classical Museum,' vol. ii. 
p. 199, and subsequently in Smith's 'Biographical Diction- 
ary ' (art. " Maecenas "), contends that the poem refers to the 
Sicilian expedition against Sextus Pompeius, a.u. c. 718. 
Macleane objects to this supposition — "that the language 
of affection is too strong for the short acquaintance which 
Horace had then enjoyed with Maecenas, and that there is 
evidence in the poem itself of the Sabine farm having come 
into Horace's possession when he wrote it; but that this 
did not occur till after the publication of the First Book of 
Satires is certain, and it is generally referred to A.U.C. 720." 

Carm. I. 

Ibis Liburnis inter alta navium, 

Amice, propugnacula, 
Paratus omne Caesaris periculum 

Subire, Maecenas, tuo. 
Quid nos, quibus te vita si superstite 

Jucunda, si contra, gravis ? 
Utrumne jussi persequemur otium, 

Non dulce, ni tecum simul. 
An hunc laborem mente laturi, decet 

Qua ferre non molles viros ? 
Feremus ; et te vel per Alpium juga 

Inhospitalem et Caucasum, 
Vel Occidentis usque ad ultimum sinum 

Forti sequemur pectore. 
Roges, tuum labore quid juvem meo, 

Imbellis ac firmus parum ? 
Comes minore sum futurus in metu. 

Qui major absentes habet ; 
Ut assidens implumibus pullis avis 

Serpentium allapsus timet 
2 D 



4l8 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Not that her presence could avail for succour, 

Albeit she felt them underneath her wing. 
Gladly in this or any war a soldier 

Would 1 enlist, for hope of thy dear grace ; 
Not that, attached by ampler teams of oxen, 

My ploughs may struggle through the stubborn glebe — 
Not that my flocks should, ere the dog-star parcheth, 

Change hot Calabria for Lucanian slopes * — 
Not that for me some villa's pomp of marble 

Should shine down white upon luxuriant vales, 
Touching the walls with which the son of Circe t 

Girded enchanted land in Tusculum. 
Enough, and more than I can need, for riches. 

Thanks to thy bounty, is already mine ; 
I am no Chremes, hoarding gold to bury j: — 

No loose-robed spendthrift lusting gold to waste. 



* The wealthy proprietors sent their flocks in summer fi-om the hot 
Calabrian plains to the wooded hills of Lucania. 

+ Telegonus, son of Circe by Ulysses, said to have founded ancient 
Tusculum on the summit of the hill, the slope of which is occupied by 
the modern Frascati, and to have there introduced the magic arts of his 
mother. The lines in the original are slightly paraphrased in the trans- 
lation, in order not to lose to the English reader the poetic idea associ- 
ating Tusculum with legendary enchantment, which the words " Cii'csea 
moenia" would have conveyed to the Latin. 

t " ' Chremes. ' The allusion is, perhaps, to a character in some play 
of Menander. " — Macleane, 



EPODE I. 419 

Magis relictis ; non, ut adsit, auxili 

Latura plus praesentibus. 
Libenter hoc et omne militabitur 

Bellum in tuae spem gratise : 
Non ut juvencis illigata pluribus 

Aratra nitantur mea ; 
Pecusve Calabris ante sidus fervidum 

Lucana mutet pascuis ; ''' 
Neque ut superni villa candens Tusculi 

Circsea tangat moenia.t 
Satis superque me benignitas tua 

Ditavit : haud paravero, 
Quod aut avarus ut Chremes terra premam.J 

Discinctus aut perdam nepos. 



420 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE II. 

ALFIUS. — THE CHARMS OF RURAL LIFE. 

This poem, in which a glowing description of country 
life and its innocent attractions is placed in the mouth of 
the rich usurer Alfius, is one of the happiest examples of 
Horace's power of polished and latent irony. Macleane 
thinks that the poem was originally written in praise of 
rural life, and that the last lines were added to give the rest 
a moral. "At any rate," he says, "the greater part of the 
speech must be admitted to be rather out of keeping with 
the supposed speaker." This alleged want of keeping does 
not strike me, nor do I believe that the last lines were " an 
afterthought." The idea is in complete harmony with the 
substance of Satire i. Book I., in which Horace says that the 

miser 

" Blessed is he — remote, as were the mortals 

Of the first age, from business and its cares — 
Who ploughs paternal fields with his own oxen 

Free from the bonds of credit or of debt.* 
No soldier he, roused by the savage trumpet. 

Not his to shudder at the angry sea ; t 
His life escapes from the contentious forum, 

And shuns the insolent thresholds of the great. 
And so he marries to the amorous tendrils 

Of the young vine the poplar's lofty stem ; 



* " Solutus omni fenore" — "who neither lends nor borrows upon 
usury : " so Torrentius and Orelli. Macleane says the words would 
equally suit any other person besides a city usurer, and would mean 
that in the country he would not be subject to the calls of creditors, and 
need not get into debt. This interpretation is perhaps too loosely 
hazarded. An illustrious Horatian critic, to whom the translator is 
largely indebted, observes that "solutus" evidently refers to usurious 



EPODE II. 421 

miser is never contented with his own lot, but rather extols 

those who follow opposite pursuits : — 

" Nemo ut avarus 
Se probet, ac potius laudet diversa sequentes ; " 

but that nevertheless the nature of the man returns to him ; 
and if you offered to let him exchange with the person he 
envies, and so be happy, he would not accept the offer. The 
same idea is expressed more briefly, Book I. Ode i. lines 
15, 35 — "The merchant, terrified by the storms, lauds the 
ease of the country, but very soon refits his battered ves- 
sels." That a rich money-lender might at some moment feel 
and express very glowingly an enthusiasm for country life 
is natural enough ; we have instances of that every day. No 
one praises or covets a country life more than a rich Jew or 
contractor. We do not know the occasion which may have 
suggested the poem ; but nothing is more likely than that 
there was a report that the famous usurer was about to buy 
a country place and retire from business; and on the strength 
of that rumour Horace wrote the poem. 

Carm. II. 

' Beatus ille, qui procul negotiis, 

Ut prisca gens mortalium, 
Paterna rura bobus exercet suis, 

Solutus omni fenore,'* 
Neque excitatur classico miles truci, 

Neque horret iratum mare,t 
Forumque vitat et superba civium 

Potentiorum limina. 
Ergo aut adulta vitium propagine 

Altas maritat populos, 

bonds, and is so employed in the Satires ; and suggests, as a more literal 
translation, '* Unshackled by the bonds of usury." 

t " Nee horret iratum mare." This does not apply to the sailor, but 
to the trader or merchant — " nee mercaturam exercet." — Orelli. 



422 THE EPODES OF HORAC^. 

Or marks from far the lowing herds that wander 

Leisurely down the calm secluded vale ; i 

Or, pruning with keen knife the useless branches, ; 

Grafts happier offspring on the parent tree ; \ 

Or in pure jars he stores the clear-prest honey ; ] 

Or shears the fleeces of his tender sheep ; '^ ] 

Or, when brown Autumn from the fields uplifteth i 

Brows with ripe coronal of fruits adorned, j 

What joy to pluck the pear himself hath grafted, i 

And his own grape, that with the purple vies, 
Wherewith he pays thee, rural god Priapus, ] 

And, landmark-guardian, Sire Silvanus, thee : t ; 

Free to recline, now under aged ilex, j 

Now in frank sunshine on the matted grass. 
While through the steep banks slip the gliding waters. 

And birds are plaintive in the forest glens, j 

And limpid fountains, with a drowsy tinkle, ' 

Invite the light wings of the noonday sleep. 

" But when the season of the storm, rude winter. 

Gathers together all its rains and snows. 
Or here and there, into the toils before them, j 

With many a hound he drives the savage boars ; i 

Or with fine net, on forked stake suspended, 

Spreads for voracious thrushes fraudful snare, ' 

And — ^joyful prizes — captures in his springes , \ 

The shy hare and that foreigner the crane. 
Who would not find in these pursuits oblivion j 

Of all the baleful cares which wait on love ? i 

Yet, if indeed he boasts an honest helpmate, I 

Who, like the Sabine wife or sunburnt spouse ■ 

* ''Aut tondet infirmas oves." Baxter strangely interprets "in- j 

firmas" as "sickly" (asgrotas) ; Orelli as "feeble" (imbecillas). Voss \ 

translates it "zarter," and so far agrees with Macleane, who considers j 

it a purely ornamental expression. ! 



EPODE 11. 423 

Aut in reducta valle mugientium 

Prospectat errantes greges ; 
Inutilesque fake ramos amputans 

Feliciores inserit ; 
Aut pressa puris mella condit amphoris ; 

Aut tondet infirmas oves ; "" 
Vel, cum decorum mitibus pomis caput 

Auctumnus agris extulit, 
Ut gaudet insitiva decerpens pira, 

Certantem et uvam purpura, 
Qua muneretur te, Priape, et te, pater 

Silvan e, tutor finium ! t 
Libet jacere, modo sub antiqua ilice, 

Modo in tenaci gramine. 
Labuntur altis interim ripis aqu^, 

Queruntur in silvis aves, 
Fontesque lymphis obstrepunt manantibus, 

Somnos quod invitet leves. 
At cum Tonantis annus hibernus Jovis 

Imbres nivesque comparat, 
Aut trudit acres hinc et hinc multa cane 

Apros in obstantes plagas ; 
Aut amite levi rara tendit retia, 

Turdis edacibus dolos ; 
Pavidumque leporem et advenam laqueo gruem 

Jucunda captat prasmia. 
Quis non malarum, quas amor curas habet, 

Hsec inter obliviscitur? 
Quod si pudica mulier in partem juvet 

Domum atque dulces liberos, >» 



+ ** Pater vSilvane, tutor finium." Silvanus, whose more usual 
attribute is the care of corn-fields and cattle, is here made to un- 
dertake the protection of boundaries, which properly belonged to 
Terminus. 



424 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Of brisk Apulian, in the cares of household 

And of sweet children bears her joyous part ; 
Who on the sacred hearth the oldest fagots 

Piles 'gainst the coming of her wearied lord ; 
And in the wattled close the milch-kine penning, 

Drains the distended udders of their load ; 
From the sweet cask draws forth the year's new vintage, 

And spreads the luxuries of an unbought feast : 
Such fare would charm me more than rarest dainties — 

Than delicate oyster of the Lucrine lake. 
Or (if from eastern floods loud-booming winter 

Drive to our seas) the turbot or the scar. 
Not softer sinks ad own the grateful palate 

The Nubian pullet or the Ionian snipe, ""^ 
Than olives chosen where they hang the thickest ; 

Or sorrel, lusty lover of green fields ; 
Or mallows, wholesome for the laden body, 

Or lambkin slain on Terminus' high feast, 
Or kidling rescued from the wolf's fierce hunger. 

How sweet, amid such feasts, to view the sheep 
Flock blithe from field to fold, see the tired oxen 

With languid neck draw back the inverted share. 
And home-born t labourers round the shining Lares 

Gathered — the faithful swarm of the rich hive !" 
Thus said the usurer Alfius, and all moneys 

Lent till the mid-month at that date calls in, 
And, hot for rural pleasures, that day fortnight 
Our would-be farmer — lends them out again.J 

* "Afira avis" — "attagen lonicus." What bird is meant by the 
** Afra avis" is a matter of uncertainty. Yonge says it is the guinea- 
fowl — Macleane inclines to the same opinion ; but we know little more 
of it than that it was speckled. The " attagen " is variously interpreted 
woodcock, snipe, and, more commonly, moorfowl. The Ionian snipe 
is to this day so incomparably the best of the snipe race, that I venture 
to think it is the veritable "attagen lonicus." 

i* " Positosque venias, ditis examen domus." This is a picture of 
the primitive rustic life, in which the labourers, familiarly with the master, 



ep6de II. 425 

Sabina qualis, aut pemsta solibus 

Pemicis uxor Apuli, 
Sacrum vetustis exstruat lignis focum 

Lassi sub adventum viri ; 
Claudensque textis cratibus Isetum pecus 

Distenta siccet ubera ; 
Et homa dulci vina promens dolio 

Dapes inemptas apparet : 
Non me Lucrina juverint conchylia, 

Magisve rhombus, aut scari, 
Si quos Eois intonata fluctibus 

Hiems ad hoc vertat mare ; 
Non Afra avis descendat in ventrem meum, 

Non attagen lonicus * 
Jucundior, quam lecta de pinguissimis 

OHva ramis arborum, 
Aut herba lapathi prata amantis, et gravi 

Malvse salubres corpori, 
Vel agna festis csesa TerminaHbus, 

Vel haedus ereptus lupo. 
Has inter epulas, ut juvat pastas oves 

Videre properantes domum, 
Videre fessos vomerem inversum boves 

Collo trahentes languido, 
Positosque vernas, ditis examen domus,t 

Circum renidentes Lares ! ' 
Haec ubi locutus fenerator Alfius, 

Jam jam futurus rusticus, 
Omnem redegit Idibus pecuniam, — 

Quaerit Kalendis ponere. J 



gathered at supper round the Lares. — Colum. xi. i, 19. " The home- 
bom slaves cluster round the master, as the bees round the queen-bee," 
— RiTTER. 

X " Omnem redegit Idibus pecuniam, — 
Quserit Kalendis ponere." 
The ides, nones, and kalends were the settling days of Rome. 



426 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE III. 

TO MAECENAS IN EXECRATION OF GARLIC. 

Horace appears to have been tempted to eat, when dining 
with Maecenas, some dish over-seasoned with garHc, unaware 
of the prevalence of that ingredient, or unprescient of its 
effects. Some commentators, whom Dillenburger fpllows, 
suppose this to have been a kind of compound salad called 
" moretum," in which cheese, oil, milk, and wine contributed 
their motley aid to the garlic. This, however, was a primi- 
tive rustic comestible not likely to have been found at the 
table of Maecenas. Whatever the dish might have been, 
Horace seems to have considered the recommendation of 

it 
If e'er a parricide with hand accursed 

Hath cut a father's venerable throat, 
Hemlock's too mild a poison — give him garlic ; 

O the strong stomachs of your country clowns ! 
What deadly drug is raging in my vitals ? 

Was viper's venom in those fraudful herbs ? 
Or was Canidia, armed with all her poisons. 

The awful cook of that infernal feast ? 
Surely Medea, wonderstruck with Jason, 

As of all Argonauts the comeliest chief,''' 
Smeared him with this soul-sickening preparation, 
Which quelled the bulls to the unwonted yoke. 
In this she steeped her present to the rival. 
From whom, avenging, soared her dragon-car. 



* " Ut Argonautas praeter omnes candidum 
Medea mirata est ducem." 
" Posteaquam Medea Jasonis ceteris omnibus Argonautis pulchrioris 
forma capta est, sic constinie, ' non vero Jasonem candidum mirata est 



EPODE III. 427 

it a bad joke, and he takes revenge upon the chief criminal, 
garHc, in the following humorous anathema. 

The commentators in general assume that Horace could 
not have taken the liberty to refer to Terentia in the con- 
cluding lines, " Manum puella," &c., and that the poem was 
therefore written before Maecenas's marriage, probably a.u.c. 
719 or 720. Ritter, on the contrary, denounces with much 
indignation the idea that Horace could impute the inde- 
corum of so familiar an intercourse with a freedwoman to 
a man of the grave occupations and dignified position of 
M^cenas, and insists on applying '• puella " to Terentia, in 
which case the poem would be written shortly after the 
marriage of Maecenas, which Ritter chooses to date, a.u.c. 
725 {i.e., a year after Franke's date for the publication of 
the Epodes). 

Carm. III. 

Parentis olim si quis impia manu 

Senile guttur fregerit, 
Edit cicutis allium nocentius. 

O dura messorum ilia ! 
Quid hoc veneni saevit in prascordiis ? 

Num viperinus his cruor 
Incoctus herbis me fefellit? an malas 

Canidia tractavit dapes ? 
Ut Argonautas praeter omnes candidum''' 

Medea mirata est ducem, 
Ignota tauris illigaturum juga 

Perunxit hoc Jasonem ; 
Hoc delibutis ulta donis pellicem. 

Serpente fugit alite. 



przeter omnes Argonautas.' " — Orelli. Macleane prefers the con- 
struction which Orelli prohibits, but I like Orelli's the best. 



428 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Never such heat from pestilential comets 

Parched dry Apulia, thirsting for a shower ; 
Less hot that gift which, through the massive shoulders 

Of sturdy Hercules, burned life away. 
Jocose Maecenas, 'tis no laughing matter : 

If e'er thou try it, may thy sweetheart's hand 
Ward off thy kiss ; and sacred be her refuge 

In the remotest borders of the bed. 



EPODE in. 429 

Nee tantus unquam siderum insedit vapor 

Siticulosae Apulise, 
Nee munus humeris efficaeis Herculis 

Inarsit sestuosius. 
At, si quid unquam tale concupiveris, 

Joeose Maecenas, precor 
Manum puella savio opponat tuo, 

Extrema et in sponda cubet. 



430 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE IV. 

AGAINST AN UPSTART. 

All the scholiasts agree in considering that the person 
satirised in this ode was the freedman Menas, lieutenant to 
Sextus Pompeius, who deserted to Augustus a.u.c. 716. 
Modern critics have objected to this assumption, and their 
objections are tersely summed up and answered by Mac- 

leane 

As tow'rds the wolf the lamb's inborn repugnance 

Nature makes my antipathy to thee, 
Thou on whose flank still burns the Iberian whipcord,"' 

Thou on whose limbs still galls the bruise of chains, 
Strut as thou wilt in arrogance of purse-pride, 

Fortune can change not the man's native breed. 
Mark, as along the Sacred Wayt thou flauntest, 

Puffing thy toga, twice three cubits wide J — 
Mark with what frankness indignation loathes thee, 

Seen in the looks of every passer-by !§ 
" He, by Triumvirs so inured to lashes, 

As tired the pubHc crier to proclaim, || 
Now ploughs some thousand fat Falernian acres. 

And wears the Appian Road out with his nags; 



* " Ibericis fimibus." These were cords made of " spartum," usually- 
said to be the Spanish broom. It was made into ropes, especially for 
ships' rigging. " It may be added, in favour of the theory which makes 
Menas the hero, that the mention of Spanish ropes seems to imply that 
the person had suffered on board ship, if not in the country itself, since, 
as Pliny tells us, ropes of spartum were especially used in ships ; and 
the only way to give point to the epithet is to suppose it had reference 
to Spain itself, or to the fleet." — Macleane. 

+ The Saci-ed Way, leading to the Capitol, was the favourite lounge 
of the idlers. 



EPODE IV. 431 

leane in his prefatory comment on the ode. In some in- 
scriptions Vedius Rufus has been named instead of Menas. 
Ritter maintains the accuracy of this identification, and 
affirms that it was no other than Vedius PolHo, a Roman 
knight, who had been originally a freedman, mentioned by 
Seneca, Pliny, and others. — See Ritter's note. 

Carm. IV. 

Lupis et agnis quanta sortito obtigit. 

Tecum mihi discordia est, 
Hibericis peruste funibus'"" latus, 

Et crura dura compede. 
Licet superbus ambules pecunia, 

Fortuna non mutat genus. 
Videsne, Sacram metiente te Viam t 

Cum bis trium ulnarum toga, J 
Ut ora vertat hue et hue euntium 

Liberrima indignatio ? § 
' Sectus flagelhs hie triumviralibus 

Prasconis ad fastidium || 
Arat Falerni mille fundi jugera 

Et Appiam mannis terit. 



+ "Cum bis trium ulnarum toga." According to Macleane, this 
applies to the width of the toga, not the length, as commonly trans- 
lated ; I follow his interpretation, but it is disputed. 

§ " Ut ora vertat hue et hue euntium 
Liberrima indignatio." 
I think with Macleane that this appears rather to mean the open in- 
dignation which made the passengers turn their looks tmvards him, than 
turn away in disgust, which is the construction of the scholiasts. Yonge 
suggests a totally different interpretation: "See how a free" {i.e., 
unreserved, undisguised) "scorn alters the cotinte7tance^^ (ora vertat) 
"of all who pass along." 

II The Triumviri Capitales had the power of inflicting summary chas- 
tisement on slaves. When the scourge was inflicted, a public crier stood 
by and proclaimed the nature of the crime. 



432 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

In public shows, despite the law of Otho,* 
He takes a foremost place and sits — a knight. 

What boots the equipment of yon floating bulwarks, 
Yon vast array of ponderous brazen prores ? 

What ! against slaves and pirates launch an army, t 
Which has for officer, — that man — that man ! " 



* Fourteen rows in the theatre and amphitheatre, immediately over 
the orchestra, were by the law of L. Roscius Otho, A.U.c. 686, appro- 
priated to the knights. As the tribunes of the soldiers had equestrian 
rank, if the person satirised were one of them, he could therefore take his 
seat in one of the fourteen rows, despite the intention of Otho, which 
was to reserve the front seats for persons of genuine rank. 

t The slaves and pirates are supposed to refer to the fleet of Sextus 
Pompeius. 



EPODE IV. 433 

Sedilibusque magnus in primis eques, 

Othone contempto, sedet !* 
Quid attinet tot ora navium gravi 

Rostrata duci pondere 
Contra latrones atque servilemt manum, 

Hoc, hoc tribuno militum ? ' 



2 E 



434 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE V. 

ON THE WITCH CANIDIA. 

None of Horace's poems excels this in point of power — 
and the power herein exhibited is of the highest kind ; it is 
power over the passions of pity and terror. The degree of 
humour admitted is just sufficient to heighten the effect of 
the more tragic element. The scene is brought before the 
eye of the reader with a marvellous distinctness. A boy of 
good birth, as is shown by the toga prcetexta and bulla which 
he wears, has been decoyed or stolen from his home, and 
carried at night to some house — probably Canidia's. The 
poem opens with his terrified exclamations, as Canidia and 
her three associate witches stand around him. He is stripped, 
buried chin-deep in a pit, and tantalised with the sight of 
food which he is not permitted to taste, till, thus wasted 
away, his liver and marrow may form the crowning ingre- 
dient of the caldron in which the other materials for a philter 
have been placed. That it is for an old profligate, whom 

Canidia 

^' But O,'^ whatever Power divine in heaven, 
O'er earth and o'er the human race presideth,t 

What means this gathering ? why on me alone. 
Fixed in fierce stare, those ominous dread faces? 

By thine own children, if, indeed, for thee % 

Lucina brought to light true fleshly children — 



* "At, O deorum," &c. The word "at," thus commencing the 
ode, is significant of the commotion and hurry of the speaker, and also 
brings the whole scene more vividly before the reader. The poem 
begins, as it were, in the middle of the boy's address to the witches, 
omitting what had gone before. 



EPODE V. 435 

Canidia is resolved to charm back to her, that the philter is 
prepared, adds to the vileness which the poet ascribes to the 
hag. This epode was probably composed about the same 
time as the 8th Satire of the First Book, in which Canidia 
and Sagana are represented seeking the ghastly materials of 
their witchcraft, and invoking Hecate and Tisiphone in the 
Esquilinian burial-ground. The poem has little of the graces 
of expression which characterise Horace's maturer odes, 
and in one or two passages the construction is faultily ob- 
scure ; but the grandeur of the whole conception, and the 
vigour of the execution, need no comment, and compensate 
for all defects. 

The scholiasts say that Canidia's real name was Gratidia, 
and that she was a Neapolitan perfume-vender. That she 
was ever a mistress of Horace's is a conjecture founded 
upon no evidence, and nothing extant in Horace justifies 
the assumption. This poem was written when Horace was 
young, and he could scarcely have remembered, except in 
his childhood, Canidia more lovely than he invariably repre- 
sents her. 

Carm. V. 

' At,'^ O deorum quidquid in caelo regit t 

Terras et humanum genus ! 
Quid iste fert tumultus ? aut quid omnium 

Voltus in unum me truces ? 
Per liberos te,J si vocata partubus 

Lucina veris affuit,§ 



+ "Regit," not "regis" — "presides," not " presidest. " The boy 
does not invoke the gods ; he is addressing Canidia. It is but a dis- 
ordered exclamation. 

+ Here he addresses Canidia. 

§ Ritter, Yonge, and Munro have ^^ adfuity 



43^ THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

By this vain purple's childish ornament *^ — 

By Jove's sure wrath — why are thy looks as deadly 
As the stepmother's on the babe she loathes, 

Or wounded wild beast's, glaring on the hunter ? " 
As the boy pleaded thus, with tremulous lip. 

From him fierce hands rent childhood's robe and bulla, 
And naked stood that form which might have moved, 

With its young innocence, a Thracian's pity. 

Canidia, all her tangled tresses crisped 

By the contracted folds of angry vipers. 
Spake, and bade mandrakes, torn from dead men's graves,^ 

Bade dismal branches of funereal cypress. 
And eggs and plumes of the night screech-owl, smeared 

With the toad's loathsome and malignant venom, 
Herbs which lolcos and Hiberia send, J 

From soils whose richest harvest-crops are poison. 
And bones, from jaw of famished wild-bitch snatched, § — 

Bade them all simmer in the Colchian caldron. || 

Meanwhile, bare-legged, fell Sagana bedews 

The whole abode with hell-drops from Avernus,f 

Her locks erect as some sea-urchin barbed. 
Or wild boar bristling as he runs. Then Veia, 



* "Per hoc inane purpurse decus precor." This is the "toga prae- 
texta" which was worn by free Roman children, together with the 
"bulla," a small round plate of gold suspended from the neck. Both 
were relinquished on the adoption of the "toga virilis," about the age 
of fifteen. 

+ " Sepulcris caprificos erutas," the wild fig rooted up from graves. 

t Hiberia here does not, as elsewhere, mean Spain, but a region, 
now part of Georgia, east of Colchis, lolcos was a seaport of Thessaly. 

§ Why bones snatched from the jaws of a hungry bitch should have 
the virtue that fits them for ingredients in the witches' caldron is not 
clearly explained by the commentators. It is not only the angry slaver 
of the famishing bitch robbed of her food that gives the bone its necro* 



EPODE V. 437 

Per hoc inane purpurse decus precor/^ 

Per improbaturum hsec Jovem, 
Quid ut noverca me intueris, aut uti 

Petita ferro belua ? ' 
Ut hsec trementi questus ore constitit 

Insignibus raptis puer, 
Impube corpus, quale posset impia 

Mollire Thracum pectora ; 
Canidia, brevibus implicata viperis 

Crines et incomptum caput, 
Jubet sepulcris caprificos erutas,t 

Jubet cupressus funebres, 
Et uncta turpis ova ranse sanguine 

Plumamque nocturnae strigis, 
Herbasque, quas lolcos atque Hiberia J 

Mittit venenorum ferax, 
Et ossa ab ore rapta jejunae canis, § 

Flammis aduri Colchicis. || 
At expedita Sagana, per totam domum 

Spargens Avernales aquas, IF 
Horret capillis ut marinus asperis 

Echinus, aut currens aper. 



mantic value — there is virtue in the bone itself. The dog meant is one 
of the ownerless wild dogs' that prowled at night for food, and haunted 
burial-grounds such as the Esquiline, where the lowest class of the poor 
were buried so near the surface of the ground that their remains could 
be easily scratched up, and the bone adapted for the caldron would be a 
human bone. vSo, in the " Siege of Corinth " — 

"And he saw the lean dogs beneath the wall 
Hold o'er the dead their carnival, 
Gorging and growling o'er carcass and limb," &c. 

11 "Flammis aduri Colchicis." The materials thus collected by the 
witches are not burned as fuel in the magic (Colchian) flames, but are 
boiled as materials for the philter, of which the marrow and liver of the 
unhappy child are the completing ingredients. 

IT From the fount Avemus. 



438 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Remorseless crone, loud grunting o'er the toil, 

With her fell spade the yawning death-pit hollows, 
Wherein they bury the yet living child, 

And twice and thrice each long day mock his famine.''^ 
Chin-deep (as waters on their brim suspend 

The swimmer) plunged, lingering he lives in dying, 
To gaze upon the food denied his lips, 

Till the parched liver and the shrivelled marrow 
Shall into philters for vile love consume, 

When once, yet staring on the food forbidden. 
The glazing eyeballs waste themselves away. 

If idle Naples and each neighbouring city 
Rightly believe, the Ariminian hag. 

Unnatural Folia, failed not that grim conclave, 
She who could draw the moon and subject stars. 

With her Thessalian witch-song, down from heaven. 

To them, with thumb-nail pressed to livid tooth. 

Which gnawed and mumbled it, spake dire Canidia. 
What said she, or what horror left untold ? 

"Ye of my deeds sure arbiters and faithful, 
O Night, O Hecate, who o'er silence reign 

In darksome hours to rites mysterious sacred. 
Now, now be present ; now on hostile homes 

Turn wrath invoked, and demon power revengeful ; 
Now, while amid the horror-breathing woods 

Lurk the wild beasts, couched languid in soft slumber, 
Dogs of Subura,+ up ! bark loud ; let all 

Mock the old lechen with a nard anointed 



* ' ' Longo die bis terque mutatse dapis 
Inemori spectaculo." 
" Longo " belongs to "die," and not to " spectaculo." " Inemori " is 
not found anywhere else ; the ordinary form is "immori." — Macleane. 
f " Subura," one of the most populous and one of the most profligate 
streets of Rome. Canidia prays that the barking of the dogs may rouse 
the street to mock the old man, skulking to other mistresses than herself, 



EPODE V. . 439 

Abacta nulla Veia conscientia 

Ligonibus duris humum 
Exhauriebat, ingemens laboribus ; 

Quo posset infossus puer 
Longo die bis terque mutatse dapis 

Inemori spectaculo ; "^ 
Cum promineret ore, quantum exstant aqua 

Suspensa mento corpora ; 
Exsucta uti medulla et aridum jecur 

Amoris esset poculum, 
Interminato cum semel fixae cibo 

Intabuissent pupulae. 
Non defuisse masculae libidinis 

Ariminensem Foliam, 
Et otiosa credidit ^eapolis, 

Et omne vicinum oppidum ; 
Quae sidera excantata voce Thessala 

Lunamque caelo deripit. 
Hie irresectum saeva dente livido 

Canidia rodens pollicem 
Quid dixit aut quid tacuit ? ' O rebus meis 

Non infideles arbitrae, 
Nox et Diana, quae silentium regis, 

Arcana cum fiunt sacra, 
Nunc, nunc adeste : nunc in hostiles domos 

Irani atque numen vertite ! 
Formidolosis dum latent silvis ferae, 

Dulci sopore languidae, 
Senem, quod omnes rideant, adulterum 

Latrent Suburanae t canes 

and thus scare him back to her. It seems clear from what follows that 
the nard or unguent was composed by Canidia, though that is disputed bj^ 
commentators, and the construction itself is obscure. It is this magical 
unguent that is to cause the dogs to bark — see Orelli's note. Absurdly 
enough it has been assumed, on the authority of this passage (for what 
other authority is there?) that Canidia was by profession a vender of 
perfumes. 



440 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Than which none subtler could these hands complete. 

But how? '^ what's this? Have they, then, lost their virtue? 
The barbarous Medea's direful drugs, 

Wherewith she wreaked her wrongs on that proud rival, 
Great Creon's daughter, yea, consumed the bride 

By venom steeped into the murderous mantle, 
And soared away destroying : — Me, nor herb 

Nor root hath failed to render its dark secrets 
Latent in inaccessible ravines. 

The beds he sleeps on are by me besprinkled + 
With Lethe of all other loves than mine. 

Ho ! ho ! yet struts he free, — at large, — protected 
By charm of witch more learned than myself. 

Ah, Varus, ah ! by no trite hackneyed philters 
Ill-fated wretch, shalt thou rush back to me, 

Thy truant heart no Marsian charms recover J — 
A mightier spell I weave ; a direr bowl 

Now will I brim, to tame thy scornful bosom. 
Sooner the sky shall sink below the sea. 

And over both the earth shall be extended, 
Than thou not burn for me, as in the smoke 

Of these black flames now burns this dull bitumen." 
Then the child spoke, not seeking, as before. 

Those impious hell-hags with mild words to soften, 



* "Quid accidit?" The spell fails — the dogs do not bark. Varus 
does not go forth into Subura, nor come to Canidia. " Do the drugs of 
Medea fail?" &c. " She speaks," says Macleane, "as if she had been 
actually using the drugs of Medea. " 

+ " Indormit unctis omnium cubilibus 
Oblivione pellicum." 
The sense of this passage is exceedingly obscure, and has been subjected 
to various interpretations. I adopt that of Orelli, viz. — Canidia had 
smeared the couch on which Varus slept with drugs to make him for- 
getful of all women but herself; taking "unctis" with "oblivione," 
anointed with oblivion — "omnium pellicum/' " of all wantons." Still 
this construction is not satisfactory, because, just before, Canidia sup- 
poses that Varus was out on his rambles, from which the barking dogs 



EPODE V. 441 

Nardo pemnctum, quale non perfectius 

Meae laborarint manus. — 
Quid accidit ? '^ Cur dira barbarae minus 

Venena Medeae valent, 
Quibus superbam fugit ulta pellicem, 

Magni Creontis filiam, 
Cum palla, tabo munus imbutum, novam 

Incendio nuptam abstulit ? 
Atqui nee herba, nee latens in asperis 

Radix fefellit me locis. 
Indormit unctis omnium cubilibus 

Oblivione pellicum.t — 
Ah ! ah ! solutus ambulat veneficse 

Scientioris carmine. 
Non usitatis, Vare, potionibus, , 

O multa fleturum caput, 
Ad me recurres ; nee vocata mens tua 

Marsis redibit vocibus : J 
Majus parabo, majus infundam tibi 

Fastidienti poculum. 
Priusque caelum sidet inferius mari, 

Tellure porrecta super, 
Quam non amore sic meo flagres, uti 

Bitumen atris ignibus.' — 
Sub haec puer, jam non, ut ante, mollibus 

Lenire verbis impias ; 

were to scare him to her, and she is surprised to find that he is quietly 
asleep. 

+ " Ad me recurres ; nee vocata mens tua 
Marsis redibit vocibus." 
The Marsian vi^itchcrafts were those in vogue with the populace. The 
sense is not, as commonly translated, that his mind or reason (mens), 
maddened by Canidia's spell, shall not be restored to him by the counter- 
charms of the Marsian witchcraft ; but that he shall run back to her, 
and that his mind or heart will not be thus restored to her by her em- 
ployment of any common vulgar incantations. No, she is now preparing 
a mightier bowl (referring to the victim present), &c. 



442 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

But pausing long, now in his last despair, 

Launched the full wrath of Thyestean curses.* 
" Witchcrafts invert not the great laws divine 

Of right and wrong as they invert things human ; t 
So to those laws my dooming curse appeals. 

And draws down wrath too dire for expiation. 
Mark where thus foully murdered I expire, 

With every night I haunt you as a Fury, % 
Mangle your cheeks, a ghost with bird-like claws ; 

For such the power of those dread gods the Manes. 
On your unquiet bosoms I shall sit 

An incubus, and murder sleep with horror ; 
And at the last, as through the streets ye slink, 

Street after street the crowd shall rise against you, 
Hither and thither hounded, till to death 

Stoned by fierce mobs, vile hags obscene, ye perish ; 



* "Thyesteas preces." Curses such as Thyestes might have invoked 
on Atreus, who slaughtered and served up at the banquet his brother's 
children. 

+ ' ' Venena magnum fas nefasque non valent 
Convertere humanam vicem ; 
Diris agam. vos." 
Of all the obscure passages in the poem this is the most obscure. The 
contradictory interpretations of various commentators have not served 
to render it less so. The translation most in vogue is that suggested 
by Lambinus : "Witchcraft (venena) can invert the great principle of 
wrong and right, but cannot invert the condition or fate (or vicissitude 
in the fate) of men," "valent" being understood in the first clause. 
Munro, Introduction, p. xxviii, adopts the arrangement of Lambinus, 
with one point of difference. " I do not think," he says, *' ' Magnum ' 
can be joined with 'fas nefasque.' I have therefore made it parenthet- 
ical where it seems to me to have much force. The meaning is, 
' venena (id quod magnum est) fas nefasque valent Convertere, humanam 
vicem non valent. ' " Ritter takes ' ' venena " as poisons which may be ben- 
eficial as medicaments, or deadly, used with malignant purposes, and are 
thus "magnum fas nefasque;" and takes "humanam vicem" as the retri- 
bution due to human deeds. Orelli, in an excursus, gives, with his usual 



EPODE V. 443 

Sed dubius unde rumperet silentium, 

Misit Thyesteas preces : '" 
' Venena magnum fas nefasque non valent 

Convertere humanam vicem ; 
Diris agam vos ; t dira detestatio 

Nulla expiatur victima. 
Quin, ubi perire jussus exspiravero, 

Nocturnus occurram Furor, J 
Petamque voltus umbra curvis unguibus, 

Quae vis deorum est Manium ; 
Et inquietis assidens praecordiis, 

Pavore somnos auferam. 
Vos turba vicatim hinc et hinc saxis petens 

Contundet obscoenas anus ; 



candour, not less than nine various interpretations, but very decidedly 
pronounces himself in favour of that which I believe he originates, and 
which is certainly a bold one. He assumes "magnum fas nefasque" to 
be the subject, and that the sense is, "the great law of wrong and right 
(divinse leges), according to human sense (humanam vicem), cannot con- 
vert (soften and bend) witchcraft or the hearts of witches." Macleane 
says, I think correctly, "that if this view of the construction were 
adopted, it would be better to render ' humanam vicem ' ' on behalf of 
men or of humanity. ' " Macleane suggests two other interpretations 
{see his note), which appear to me more open to objection. Yonge, 
following Orelli in the main points, asks whether it may not be better 
to reverse the order, and take "venena" for the nominative case — thus, 
"sorceries (and those who use them) cannot change [i.e., turn aside or 
defeat) the divine law, as they can men and men's law ; therefore I 
appeal to them : such an appeal will draw down a wrath implacable. " 
He renders "humanam vicem" "inhuman fashion," "after the man- 
ner of men." I have adopted the sense of this interpretation. Witch- 
crafts is a better word here than sorceries, which properly signify divina- 
tion by lot. Two other interpretations have been suggested to me by 
eminent scholars : ist. Witchcraft cannot distort (or overthrow) the 
great rules of right and wrong in the interest of men (taking * ' human- 
am vicem " in the sense, "hominum causa"). 2d, Witchcraft cannot 
overthrow the great law of wrong and right — human retribution. 
X "Furor"— literally, " a personified madness." 



444 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

By wolves and Esquilinian birds of prey 

Your limbs unburied shall be rent and scattered. 

Nor shall my parents, who alas ! survive 

To mourn me, lose this spectacle of vengeance." 



I 

1 
EPODE V. 445 \ 



Post insepulta membra different lupi 

Et Esquilinae alites ; 
Neque hoc parentes, heu mihi superstites, 

Effugerit spectaculum.' 



44^ I'HE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE VI. 

AGAINST CASSIUS. 

It is by no means clear who is the unlucky object of 
these verses. Acron says he was a satirical poet of the 
name of Cassius, upon the strength of which the scholiast 
in Cruquius assumes him to have been the not uncelebrated 
orator Cassius Severus, who was banished by Augustus, and 
died in poverty and exile about sixty-three years after the 

date 

Why snap at the guests who do nobody harm, 

Turning tail at the sight of a wolf? 
O cur ! thy vain threats why not venture on me, 

Who can give back a bite for a bite ? 
Like mastiff Molossian or Sparta's dun hound, 

Kindly friend to the shepherd am I ; 
But I prick up my ears, and away through the snows, 

If a wild beast of prey nm before ; 
But thou, if thou fillest the woods with thy bark, 

Art struck dumb at the sniff of a bone. 
Ah, beware ! I am rough when I come upon knaves. 

Ah, beware of a toss from my horns ! 
I'm as sharp as the wit whom Lycambes deceived. 

Or the bitter foe Bupalus roused ; "' 
Dost thou think, when a cur shows the grin of his teeth. 

That Til weep, unavenged, like a child ? 



* Archilochus, to whom Lycambes refused his daughter Neobule, 
after having first promised her to him. The poet avenged himself in 
verses so stinging, that Lycambes is said to have hanged himself. Bu- 
palus was a sculptor, who, with his brother artist Athenis, ridiculed or 
caricatured the uncomely features of Hipponax, and his verses are said 
(though not truly) to have had the same fatal effect on the sculptor that 
those of Archilochus had upon Lycambes. 



EPODE fi% 



447 



date of this ode. This supposition is not tenable, for Cassius 
Sevems, as Orelli remarks, must have been a boy, or a youth 
of about twenty, when the ode was composed ; nor is there 
any authority on record that Cassius Severus was a poet. 
Other commentators have supposed the person meant was 
M^vius or Bavius. If the right name be Cassius, nothing 
is known about him ; nor is it of any importance. Horace's 
invective, for what we know to the contrary, might have 
been as unjust and inappropriate as the lampoons of irritable 
young poets generally are. Ritter conjectures the person 
there satirised to have been Furius Bibaculus, notorious for 
the bitterness of his iambics, and who included Octavian 
Caesar in his attacks. 

Carm. VI. 

Quid immerentes hospites vexas, canis, 

Ignavus adversum lupos? 
Quin hue inanes, si potes, vertis minas, 

Et me remorsurum petis ? 
Nam, qualis aut Molossus, aut fulvus Lacon, 

Amica vis pastoribus, 
Agam per altas aure sublata nives, 

Quaecunque prsecedet fera : 
Tu, cum timenda voce complesti nemus, 

Projectum odoraris cibum. 
Cave, cave : namque in malos asperrimus 

Parata tollo cornua; 
Qualis Lycambae spretus infido gener, 

Aut acer hostis Bupalo.^' 
An, si quis atro dente me petiverit, 

Inultus ut flebo puer ? 



448 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE VII. 

TO THE ROMANS. 

This poem is referred by Orelli (who rightly considers it 
composed at a comparatively early age) to the beginning of 
the war of Perusia, a.u.c. 713-14, to which period the i6th 
Epode is ascribed. Others refer it to a.u.c. 716, the expe- 
dition 

O guilty ! whither, whither would ye run ? 

Why swords just sheathed to those right hands refitted ? 
Is there too little of the Latian blood 

Shed on the land or wasted on the ocean, 
Not that the Roman may consign to flames 

The haughty battlements of envious Carthage ; 
Not that the intact Briton may be seen 

In captive chains the Sacred Slope descending ; 
But that, compliant to the Parthian's prayer, 

By her own right hand this great Rome shall perish? 
Not so with wolves ; lions not lions rend ; 

The wild beast preys not on his own wild kindred. 
Is it blind frenzy, or some demon Power, '^ 

Or wilful crime that hurries you thus headlong ? 
Reply ! All silent ; pallor on all cheeks, 

And on all minds dumb conscience-stricken stupor. 
So is it then ! so rest on Roman heads 

Doom, and the guilt of fratricidal murder, 
Ever since t Remus shed upon this soil 

The innocent blood atoned for by descendants. 



* "Vis acrior," "a fatal necessity;" equivalent to 6eov ^lav. — /| 
Orelli, Macleane. 

i* "Ut immerentis," &c. *'Ut" here has the signification of **ex 
quo," ever since. — Orelli, Macleane. 



EPODE VII. 449 

dition of Augustus against Sextus Pompeius, which is not 
very probable ; others, again, including Franke, to the 
much later date of 722, the last war between Augustus and 
Mark Antony. Ritter contends that it relates to the war 
against Brutus and Cassius. 

Carm. VII. 

Quo, quo scelesti ruitis ? aut cur dexteris 

Aptantur enses conditi? 
Parumne campis atque Neptuno super 

Fusum est Latini sanguinis, 
Non, ut superbas invidae Carthaginis 

Romanus arces ureret ; 
Intactus aut Britannus ut descenderet 

Sacra catenatus Via, 
Sed ut, secundum vota Parthorum, sua 

Urbs haec periret dextera ? 
Neque hie lupis mos, nee fuit leonibus 

Unquam, nisi in dispar, feris. 
Furorne caecus, an rapit vis acrior ? * 

An culpa ? Responsum date ! 
Tacent ; et albus ora pallor inficit, 

Mentesque perculsae stupent. 
Sic est : acerba fata Romanos agunt, 

Scelusque fraternse necis, 
Ut t immerentis fluxit in terram Remi 

Sacer nepotibus cruor. 



Epode VIII. Omitted. 



2 F 



450 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPOD E IX. 

To M^CENAS. 

The date of this ode is not to be mistaken. It "was 
written when the news of Actium was fresh, in September 
A.u.c. 723. It was addressed to Maecenas, and it is impos- 
sible to read it and suppose he had just arrived from Actium, 
where some will have it he was engaged." — Macleane. 

The fine ode, Book I. 37, "Nunc est bibendum," was writ- 
ten a year later, after the news of the taking of Alexandria 
and the death of Cleopatra. In both these odes it will be 
observable that Horace avoids naming Mark Antony — some 
say from his friendship to the Triumvir's son lulus, to whom 
he addresses Ode ii. Lib. IV.; but at the battle of Actium 
lulus was a mere boy, and it is not possible to conceive how 

Horace 

When (may Jove grant it !) shall I quaff with thee 

Under thy lofty dome, my glad Maecenas,^ 
Cups of that Caecuban reserved for feasts — 

Quaff in rejoicing for victorious Caesar, 
While with the hymn symphonious music swells — 

Here Dorian lyre, there Phrygian fifes commingling ? 
As late we feasted, when from ocean chased. 

The Son of Neptune fled his burning navies,t 
He who did threaten to impose on Rome 

That which he took from slaves, his friends — the fetter. 
A Roman (ah ! deny it after times), J 

Sold into bondage to a female master, 
Empales her camp-works, § and parades her arms. 

And serves, her soldier, under wrinkled eunuchs. 

* "Beate Maecenas." The epithet "beate" seems here to apply to 
the gladness of Maecenas at the good news, rather than to his general 
opulence or felicitous fortunes. 

+ "Neptunius dux," Sextus Pompeius, who boasted himself to be 



EPODE IX. 451 

Horace was even acquainted with him at that time. There 
must have been some other reason for this reticence, and 
it is quite as hkely to have been one of artistic taste as one 
founded on personal or pohtical considerations ; for Horace 
does not mention by name Cleopatra, nor even Sextus 
Pompeius. It is consistent with the dignity of lyric song 
to avoid the direct mention of the name of our national 
enemy, especially if conquered. In an English lyrical 
poem on the Crimean war, we should scarcely think it 
strange if the poet did not obtrude on us the name of 
Nicholas. 

Carm. IX. 

Quando repostum C^cubum ad festas dapes, 

Victore l^tus Cassare, 
Tecum sub alta, sic Jovi gratum, domo, 

Beate Maecenas,"^ bibam, 
Sonante mixtum tibiis carmen lyra, 

Hac Dorium, ihis barbarum ? 
Ut nuper, actus cum freto Neptunius 

Dux t fugit, ustis navibus, 
Minatus Urbi vincla, quae detraxerat 

Servis amicus perfidis. 
Romanus, t eheu, posteri negabitis, 

Emancipatus feminae, 
Fert vallum § et arma miles, et spadonibus 

Servire rugosis potest. 



the Son of Neptune. Though Horace speaks of the rejoicing at the 
defeat of Sextus Pompeius as if it were of late ( " ut nuper "), it occurred 
between five and six years before (a.u.c. 718). Fugitive slaves formed 
a large part of the force of Sextus Pompeius. 

+ This does not refer to Mark Antony himself, but to the Roman 
soldiers under him. The singular number is used poetically. 

§ "Fert vallum." The Roman soldier carried palisades ("vallum") 
for an empaled camp. 



452 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Shaming war's standards, in their midst, the sun 

Beholds a tent lawn-draped against mosquitoes.* 
Hitherwards,t then, Gaul's manly riders wheeled 

Two thousand fretting steeds, and shouted " Caesar." 
And all along the hostile fleet swift prores 

Backed from the fight, and slunk into the haven. J 
Hail, God of Triumph ! why delay so long 

The golden cars and sacrificial heifers ? 
Hail, God of Triumph ! from Jugurthine wars 

Thou brought'st not back to Rome an equal chieftain ; 
Not Africanus,§ to whom Valour built 

A sepulchre on ground which once was Carthage. 
Routed by sea, by land, the Foe hath changed 

For weeds of mourning his imperial purple ; 
Or spreading sails to unpropitious winds 

For Crete, ennobled by her hundred cities ; 
Or by the south blast dashed on Afric's sands. 

Or, drifting shoreless, lost in doubtful seas. 

Ho there, good fellow ! out with larger bowls, 
And delicate Chian wines, or those of Lesbos ; 

Or rather, mix us lusty Caecuban, 

A juice austere, which puts restraint on sickness ; 

The Care-Unbinder well may free us now 

From every doubt that fortune smiles on Caesar. 

* " Conopium." The mosquito net or curtain in use in Egypt, and 
still common in Italy and hot climates, placed in the midst of the 
"signa militaria" — i.e., the rising ground on which the military stand- 
ards were grouped round the prsetorium or imperial tent. 

t "At hue." The reading in the MSS. varies. Orelli has "at 
hoc," and takes "hoc" with " frementes Galli." I prefer Macleane's 
reading, "at hue," taking " frementes " with " equos ; " "hue" thus 
means ' hither," ^' to our side." Ritter has " ad hunc," contending that 
"ad" has the force of " adversus " — i. e., against Antonius, who is signi- 
fied, though not named. Munro has also "ad hunc," observing that " it 
has most authority ; but what Horace did here write it is impossible to 



EPODE IX. 453 

Interque signa turpe militaria 

Sol adspicit conopium.* 
At hue t frementes verterunt bis mille equos 

Galli, canentes Caesarem, 
Hostiliumque navium portu latent 

Puppes sinistrorsum cit^. % 
lo Triumphe, tu moraris aureos 

Currus, et intaetas boves ? 
lo Triumphe, nee Jugurthino parem 

Bello reportasti dueem, 
Neque Afrieanum, § eui super Carthaglnem 

Virtus sepulcrum condidit. 
Terra marique victus hostis punico 

Lugubre mutavit sagum ; 
Aut ille centum nobilem Cretam urbibus, 

Ventis iturus non suis, 
Exercitatas aut petit Syrtes Noto, 

Aut fertur incerto mari. 
Capaciores affer hue, puer, scyphos, 

Et Chia vina aut Lesbia. 
Vel, quod fluentem nauseam coerceat, 

Metire nobis Caecubum : 
Curam metumque Caesaris rerum juvat 

Dulci Lyseo solvere. 

say, * Ad hunc' may = 'ad solem.' " As the line refers to the desertion 
to Cgesar of the Gauls, or cavalry of Galatia, under their king Deiotarus, 
"at hue" seems the simplest interpretation. 

t ' ' Hostiliumque navium portu latent 
Puppes sinistrorsum citae." 
Macleane considers the meaning of the words impenetrably obscure, 
from our ignorance of the Roman nautical phrases. He inclines to 
favour Bentley's supposition, that " sinistrorsum citae " may be equiva- 
lent to TTvfiv'nvKpva-aa-Oai, " to back water ;" adding, " something of that 
sort, connected with flight, I have no doubt it means," 

§ "Neque Africanum," not, as some would have it, "Africano," as 
referring to the African war. 



454 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE X. 

ON Mi^VIUS SETTING OUT ON A VOYAGE. 

The name of Msevius has become proverbially identified 
with the ideal of a bad poet ; but, after all, the justice of 
this very unpleasant immortality rests upon no satisfactory 
evidence. Virgil, with laconic disdain, dismisses him and 
Bavius to obloquy, and this poem is a specimen of Horace's 
mode, in his hot youth, of treating a person to whom he 
owed a grudge. But poets are very untrustworthy judges of 
the merits of a contemporary poet, whom, for some reason 
or other, they dislike. If nothing of Southey be left to 
remote posterity, and he is only then to be judged by what 
Byron has said of him, Southey would appear a sort of 
Masvius. On the other hand, what would Byron seem if 
nothing were left of his works, and, one or two thousand 
years hence, he were to be judged by the opinions of his 
verse which Southey and Wordsworth and Coleridge have 
left on record ? As to the severest things said of Msevius 
by writers of a later generation, and who had probably 
never read a line of him, they are but echoes of the old 
lampoons, " Give a dog a bad name," &c. If it be true, 
as the commentator in Cruquius says, that Maevius was " a 
detractor of all learned men," and a cultivator of archaisms, 
or an elder school of expression, "sectator vocum antiqua- 

rum," 

Under ill-boding auspices puts forth the vessel 

Which has Msevius — a rank-smelling cargo — on board ; 

Either side of that vessel, with surges the roughest, 
O be mindful, I pray thee, wild Auster, to scourge ! 

On an ocean upheaved from its inmost foundations, 
May the dark frowning Eurus snap cables and oars ; 



EPODE X. 455 

mm/' it is probable enough that he incurred the resentment 
of Horace and the scorn of Virgil by his attacks on their 
modem style, and that his adherence to the elder forms of 
Latin poetry was uncongenial to their own taste. For 
Virgil's contemptuous mention, indeed, there might be 
some cause less general, if Maevius and Bavius ^Tote the 
Anti-Bucolica ascribed to them — i.e., two pastorals in parody 
of the Eclogues ; and especially if Msevius were the author 
of a very ready and a very ^vitty attempt to turn him into 
ridicule. Virgil, reciting the First Book of his Georgics, 
after the words, " Nudus ara, sere nudus," came to a dead 
halt, when some one, said to be either Msevius or Bavius, 
finished the line by calling out, "habebis frigore febrem." 
AVhoever made that joke must have been clever enough to 
be a disagreeable antagonist. One thing, at all events, 
seems pretty evident — viz., that Maevius must have had 
power of some kind to excite the muse of Horace to so 
angry an excess. Had he been a man wholly without mark 
or following, he could scarcely have stung to such wrath 
even a youthful poet. Be that as it may, this ode has all 
the vigour of a good hater, and there is much of the gusto 
of true humour in its extravagance. The exact date of its 
composition is unknown, but it bears the trace of very 
early youth. Grotefend assigns it to A.u.c. 716, when 
Horace was twenty-seven. 



Carm. X. 

Mala soluta navis exit alite, 
Ferens olentem Maevium : 

Ut horridis utrumque verberes latus, 
Auster, memento fluctibus ! 

Niger rudentes Eurus, inverso mari, 
Fractosque remos differat ; 



4S6 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

And may Aquilo rise in his might as when rending 

Upon hill-peaks the holm-oaks that rock to his blast ! 
On the blackness of night let no friendly star ghmmer 

Save the baleful Orion, whose setting is storm ; 
Nor the deep know a billow more calm than the breakers 

Which o'erwhelmed the victorious armada of Greece, 
When, from Ilion consumed, to the vessel of Ajax 

Pallas '" turned the wrath due to her temple profaned ! 
Ha, what sweat-drops will run from the brows of thy sailors. 

And how palely thy puddle-blood ooze from thy cheeks ; 
As thou call'st out for aid — with that shriek which shames 
manhood t — 

On the Jove who disdains such a caitiff to hear ; 
When thy keel strains and cracks in the deep gulf Ionic, 

Howling back the grim howl of the stormy south-blast. 
But O ! if in some desolate creek thou shalt furnish 

To the maw of the sea-gulls a banquet superb, ,. 
To the Tempests a lamb and lewd goat shall be offered 

As a tribute of thanks for deliverance from thee. 



* It is cleverly said by one of the critics, that Pallas is appropriately 
enough referred to here as the avenger of the bad poetry with which 
Msevius had insulted her, 

t *'///a non virilis ejulatio." He speaks as though he heard the 
man crying. — Macleane. 



EPODE X. 457 

Insurgat Aquilo, quantus altis montibus 

Frangit trementes ilices ; 
Nee sidus atra nocte amicum appareat, 

Qua tristis Orion cadit ; 
Quietiore nee feratur aequore, 

Quam Graia victorum manus, 
Cum Pallas ^ usto vertit iram ab Ilio 

In impiam Ajacis ratem ! 
O quantus instat navitis sudor tuis, 

Tibique pallor luteus, 
Et ilia non virilis ejulatio, t 

Preees et aversum ad Jovem, 
lonius udo cum remugiens sinus 

Noto carinam ruperit ! 
Opima quod si praeda curvo litore 

Porrecta mergos juveris, 
Libidinosus immolabitur caper 

Et agna Tempestatibus. 



Epodes XI. AND XII. Omitted. 



458 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE XIII. 

TO FRIENDS. 

Of all the Epodes, this, of which the metre consists of a 
hexameter verse, with one made up of a dimeter iambic 
and half a pentameter, appears to have most of the lyrical 
spirit and character of the Odes. The poem, addressed 
to a party of friends in winter, suggests comparison with 
the 9th Ode of the First Book, "Vides, ut alta stet nive 
candidum," also a winter song; but the occasion is very 
different, and the spirit that pervades it not less so. Ode 
ix. Lib. I. has no reference to public troubles; unless, 
indeed, a reader should indorse the very far-fetched sup- 
position that verse 7, " Permitte divis caetera," has a poli- 
tical allusion. Its main image is in the picture of an 
individual, and the happy mode in which, while yet young, 
that individual may pass his day. Its tone is cheerful, and 
with no insinuation of pathos. This epode, on the other 
hand, is evidently addressed to friends excited by anxieties 

and 

Frowning storm has contracted the face of the heaven. 

Rains and snows draw the upper air heavily down ; 
Now the sea, now the forests, resound with the roar 

Of wild Aquilo rushing from hill-tops on Thrace. 
Seize, my friends, on To-day — foul or fair it is ours — 

While yet firm are the knees, nor unseemly is joy; 
And let Gravity loosen his hold on the brows* 

Which he now overcasts with the cloud of his scowl. 

* "Obducta solvatur fronte senectus." "Obducta," as if clouded 
with care and sadness. — Orelli, Orelli interprets "senectus" in the 
sense of " morositas," " taedium," to which the word "senium " is more 
frequently applied. Maclearie renders it "melancholy," in which sense, 
however, he allows it is used nowhere else. I think the right meaning 
is "gravity" or "austerity," in which sense it is employed by Cicero, 
De Clar. Orat. 76, "Plena litteratae senectutis oratio." 



EPODE XIII. 459 

and apprehensions in common. If it be allowable to draw 
a conjecture from the touching illustration of the fate of 
Achilles, doomed in the land of Assaracus to a stormy life 
and an early death, the poem might have been written be- 
tween the date of Horace's departure into Asia Minor, in the 
service of Brutus, and that of the trials and dangers which 
closed at the field of Philippi, a.u.c. 712. Ritter, indeed, 
places its date in the interval between the death of Cassius 
and the battle of Philippi. It may, however, be observed, 
that if the invitation to the feastmaster to bring forth the 
wine stored in the consulship of Torquatus is to be taken 
literally, wine of that age could scarcely have been found in 
the commissariat of Brutus. If not written while in the camp 
of Brutus, it was probably composed between a.u.c. 712 and 
716, soon after Horace's return to Rome, before the fortunes 
of his life, and perhaps his political views, were changed by 
the favour of Maecenas, and while his chief associates would 
naturally have been among the remnants of the party with 
whom he had fought, and to whose minds (if there be any- 
thing peculiarly appropriate in the reference to Achilles) 
mihtary dangers in a foreign land might still be the salient 
apprehension. It is evidently written some years before 
Ode ix. Lib. I. Horace here classes himself emphatically 
with the young. In Ode ix. he addresses Thaliarchus, or 
the feasttnaster, with the half-envious sentiment of a man 
w^ho points out the pleasures of youth to another — who yet 
sympathises with those pleasures, but is somewhat receding 
from them himself. 

Carm. XIII. 

Horrida tempestas caelum contraxit, et imbres 

Nivesque deducunt Jovem ; nunc mare, nunc siluse 

Threicio Aquilone sonant : rapiamus, amici, 
Occasionem de die, dumque virent genua, 

Et decet, obducta solvatur fronte senectus.* 



4^0 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Broach the cask which was born with myself in the year 

Of the Consul Torquatus.* All else be unsaid ; 
For, perchance, by some turn in our fortunes, a god 

May all else to their place in times brighter restore. 
Now let nard Achgemenian aiford us its balm ; 

Doubt and dread let the chords of Cyllenet dispel; 
Listen all to the song which the Centaur renowned 

Sang of old to the ears of his great foster-son : — 
"Boy invincible, goddess-born, mortal thyself, J 

The domain of Assaracus waits thee afar ; 
There the petty § Seaman der's cold streams cut their way, 

And there slidingly lapses the smooth Simois. 
From that land, by the certain decree of their woof, 

Have the Weavers of Doom broken off thy return, 
And thy mother, the blue-eyed, shall never again 

Bear thee back o'er the path of her seas to thy home. 
But when there, let each burden of evils ordained. 

From thy bosom be lifted by wine and by song ; 
Soothers they of a converse so sweet, it can charm 

All the cares which deform our existence away." 



* *' Tu vina Torquato," &c. Here he addresses himself to the master 
of the feast. Sextus Manhus Torquatus was consul A.U.C. 689, the year 
of Horace's birth — "O nata mecum consule Manlio," Lib. III. xxi., i. 

t "Fide Cyllenea," — viz., the lyre, invented by Mercury, bom on 
Mount Cyllene, in Arcadia. There seems to me much beauty in the 
choice of the word, which introduces an image of Arcadian freedom 
from care — the ideal holiday life. 

+ Achilles. 

§ Ritter supposes that the Scamander is here emphatically called 
small (parvi Scamandri flumina) antithetically to " grandi alumno" — 
the great hero who found the scene of his actions by a stream so small. 
Should this conjecture, exquisitely critical, if not too refined, be ad- 
mitted, then "lubricus et Simois" must form a part of the antithesis 
insinuated ; /. e. , actions so great beside a stream so small — actions so 
vehement and of renown so loud, beside a stream so smooth. 



EPODE XIII. 461 

Tu vina Torquato move Consule pressa meo.'' 
Cetera mitte loqui : deus haec fortasse benigna 

Reducet in sedem vice. Nunc et Achaemenio 
Perfundi nardo juvat, et fide Cyllenea t 

Levare diris pectora sollicitudinibus ; 
Nobilis ut grandi cecinit Centaurus alumno : 

* Invicte, mortalis dea nate puer Thetide, J 
Te manet Assaraci tellus, quam fi-igida parvi § 

Findunt Scamandri flumina lubricus et Simois, 
Unde tibi reditum certo subtemine Parcse 

Rupere ; nee mater domum caemla te revehet. 
Illic omne malum vino cantuque levato, 

Deformis segrimoniae dulcibus alloquiis.' 



462 THE EPODES OF HORACE. \ 

\ 

J 

EPODE XIV. ; 

TO MAECENAS IN EXCUSE FOR INDOLENCE IN COMPLETING 
THE VERSES HE HAD PROMISED. 

It is impossible to say whether the verses thus promised j 
and deferred were, as commonly supposed, the collection , 
composed in this Book of Epodes, or some single iambic 
poem. The context seems to favour the latter supposition. ! 

The " 

Wily this soft sloth, through inmost sense diffusing 1 

Oblivion as complete I 

As if with parched lip I had drained from Lethe ] 

Whole beakers brimmed with sleep ? — j 

Thou kill'st me with that question oft -repeated — 1 

Maecenas, truthful man,*" j 

A song I promised thee ; to keep my promise ' 

A god, a god forbids — 
Forbids the iambics, for I have begun them, [ 

To shape themselves to close. t | 

Thus it is said, by love inflamed, the Teian \ 

Lost his diviner art : 
And on the shell to which he wailed his sorrow. 

Music imperfect died. 
Thou too art scorched; enjoy thy lot; no fairer \ 

Flame, shot from Helen's eyes, 
Fired Troy : — me Phryne burns — a wench too glowing 

To stint her warmth to one. 



* " Candide Maecenas." "Candide" here has the signification of 
honourable or trnthful. You kill me — you, a man of honour — asking 
me so often why I do not fulfil my promise. 

t "Ad umbilicum adducere," is to bring a volume to the last sheet. 
r— Maclean E. 



EPODE XIV. 463 

The beauty who inflames Maecenas, so gracefully mentioned 
at the close of the poem, is, according to the scholiasts, 
certainly Terentia, whom M^cenas was then either married 
to or courting. And that assumption is generally adopted 
by modern critics. Still it scarcely seems consistent with 
Roman manners, or with Horace's good breeding and knov/- 
ledge of the world, that he should im.ply a comparison be- 
tween his passing caprice for a public wanton, and the 
honourable love of a man of the highest station to the lady 
he had married, or was wooing in marriage. 



Carm. XIV. 

Mollis inertia cur tantam diffuderit imis 

Oblivionem sensibus, 
Pocula Lethseos ut si ducentia somnos 

Arente fauce traxerim, 
Candide Maecenas,* occidis s^pe rogando : 

Deus, deus nam me vetat 
Inceptos, olim promissum carmen, iambos 

Ad umbilicum adducere.t 
Non aliter Samio dicunt arsisse Bathyllo 

Anacreonta Teium, 
Qui persaepe cava testudine flevit amorem, 

Non elaboratum ad pedem. 
Ureris ipse miser : quod si non pulchrior ignis 

Accendit obsessam Ilion, 
Gaude sorte tua ; me libertina, neque uno 

Contenta, Phryne macerat. 



464 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 



EPODE XV. 

TO NEiERA. 

This poem may have been an imitation of the Greek, but 
as Horace pointedly introduces his own name as that of the 
complainant, it must be inferred that, at all events, he meant 
to be understood as speaking in his own person. The pro- 
bability 

'Twas night — the moon shone forth in cloudless heaven 

Amid the lesser stars, 
When thou didst mock, in vows myself had taught thee, 

The great presiding gods ; 
Closer than round the ilex clings the ivy, 

Clasping me with twined arms : 
" Long as the wolf shall prey upon the sheepfold — 

Long as the seaman's foe, 
Baleful Orion, rouse the wintry billows — 

Or the caressing breeze 
Ripple the unshorn ringlets of Apollo, 

Our mutual love shall be ! " 
Ah ! thou shalt mourn to find me firm, Neaera ; 

For if in Flaccus aught 
Of man be left, he brooks not halved embraces ; 

Stooped to no second rank, 
His love shall leave thee, and explore its equal. 

The heart, in which the pang 
Of the last treason once makes sure its entry. 

Is ever henceforth proof 
To charms which perfidy has rendered hateful. 

And thou, O happier one ! 
Whoe'er thou art, in my defeat exulting. 

Be rich in herds and lands ; 



EPODE XV. 465 

babillty is in favour of the supposition that it was the ex- 
pression of a genuine sentiment, and addressed to a real per- 
son. Macleane pushes too far his sceptical theory that 
Horace's love-poems are merely artistic exercises, like those 
of Cowley. 

Carm. XV. 

Nox erat, et cselo fulgebat Luna sereno 

Inter minora sidera, 
Cum tu, magnorum numen Isesura deorum, 

In verba jurabas mea, 
Artius atque hedera procera adstringitur ilex, 

Lentis adhaerens brachiis : 
Dum pecori lupus, et nautis infestus Orion 

Turbaret hibernum mare, 
Intonsosque agitaret ApoUinis aura capillos, . 

Fore hunc amorem mutuum. 
O dolitura mea multum virtute Nesera ! 

Nam, si quid in Flacco viri est, 
Non feret assiduas potiori te dare noctes, 

Et quaeret iratus parem. 
Nee ^emel offensae cedet constantia formae, 

Si certus intrarit dolor. 
Et tu, quicunque es felicior atque meo nunc 

Superbus incedis malo, 



2 G 



466 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

And as for gold, I give thee all Pactolus ; 

Know all the lore occult 
Stored by Pythagoras re-born ; in beauty 

Nireus himself excel ; 
And yet, alas! in store for thee my sorrow, 

Thou too wilt mourn 
Loves with such ease made over to another- 

My turn for mockery then ! 



EPODE XV. 467 

Sis pecore et multa dives tellure licebit, 

Tibique Pactolus fluat, 
Nee te Pythagorae fallant arcana renati, 

Formaque vincas Nirea ; 
Eheu ! translates alio maerebis amores : 

Ast ego vicissim risero. 



468 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

EPODE XVI. 

TO THE ROMAN PEOPLE (OR RATHER TO HIS OWN 
POLITICAL friends). 

This poem is generally supposed to have been composed 
at the commencement of the Perusian war, a.u.c. 713 — 
the year following the battle of Philippi, when the state of 
Italy was indeed deplorable, and the fortunes of Horace 
himself at the worst. He had forfeited his patrimony, and 
it was two years before he was even introduced to Maecenas. 
At that time he would have been twenty-four. The poem 

has 
Another age worn out in civil wars,* 

And Rome sinks weighed down by her own sheer forces, 
Whom nor the bordering Marsians could destroy ; 

Nor Porsena, threatening with Etruscan armies ; 
Nor rival Capua,t nor fierce Spartacus, 

Nor Allobroge J in all revolts a traitor ; 
Nor fierce Germania's blue-eyed giant sons ; 

Nor Hannibal, abhorred by Roman mothers, § — 
That is the Rome which we, this race, destroy ; 

We, impious victims by ourselves devoted, 
And to the wild beast and the wilderness 

Restoring soil which Romans called their country. 
Woe ! on the ashes of Imperial Rome 

Shall the barbarian halt his march, a victor ; 
And the wild horseman with a clanging hoof 

Trample the site which was the world's great city. 
And — horrid sight — in scorn to winds and sun 

Scatter the shrouded bones of Rome's first founder. 11 



* "Altera aetas," the preceding age being that of Sulla. 

t ''^mula nee virtus Capuse." Capua, after the battle of Cannae, 
aspired to the 'imperium' of Italy. — Liv. 23, 2. 

X "Novisque rebus infidelis Allobrox." This line is generally sup- 
posed to refer to the Allobrogian ambassadors, who, at the time of 



EPODE XVI. 469 

has the character of youth in its defects and its beauties. 
The redundance of its descriptive passages is in marked 
contrast to the terseness of description which Horace studies 
in his odes ; and there is something declamatory in its gen- 
eral tone which is at variance with the simpler utterance 
of lyrical art. On the other hand, it has all the warmth 
of genuine passion; and in sheer vigour of composition 
Horace has rarely excelled it. 

Carm. XVI. 

Altera jam teritur bellis civilibus setas,'"' 

Suis et ipsa Roma viribus ruit : 
Quam neque finitimi valuerunt perdere Marsi, 

Minacis aut Etrusca Porsense manus, 
yEmula nee virtus Capuae,t nee Spartacus acer, 

Novisque rebus infideHs Allobrox, J 
Nee fera cserulea domuit Germania pube, 

Parentibusque abominatus Hannibal, § 
Impia perdemus devoti sanguinis astas, 

Ferisque rursus occupabitur solum. 
Barbarus, heu ! cineres insistet victor, et Urbem 

Eques'^sonante verberabit ungula, 
Qugeque carent ventis et solibus ossa Quirini, \\ 

Nefas videre ! dissipabit insolens. 

Catiline's conspiracy, promised to aid it, but afterwards betrayed the 
conspirators, and became the chief witnesses against them. The Allo- 
broges, a Gallic people on the left bank of the Rhone, two years later 
broke out in war, and, invading Gallia Narbonensis, were defeated by 
the governor of that province, C. Pomptinius. The line may, however, 
be intended to designate the general character of this people, without 
any special reference to the conduct of their ambassadors in the con- 
spiracy of Catiline. 

§ "Parentibusque abominatus Hannibal." Orelli and Dillenburger 
interpret "parentibus" as "our fathers," "the former generation." 
Doering, Ritter, and Macleane, interpret the word in the sense of 
"bella matribus detestata," c. i. i, 24, in which latter sense the line is 
translated. 

II "Quaeque carent ventis et solibus ossa Quirini." I have rendered 



4/0 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

If haply all, or those amongst you all, 

Who be of nobler nature, ask for counsel 
How to escape the endurance of such ills, 

I know none better than this old example : 
Leaving their lands, their Lares, and their shrines. 

To wolf and wild boar, went forth the Phocaeans,* 
One State entire, accursing the return ; — 

Go we wherever a free foot may lead us, 
No matter what the billow or the blast, 

Welcome alike be Africus or Notus. 
Are ye agreed ? t Who can this vote amend ? 

Why pause ? To sea ! accept the favouring auspice. 
Yet ere we part thus swear : When the firm rocks, 

In the deep bosom of the ocean buried, J 
Rise to the light and float along the wave, 

Then, nor till then, return for us be lawful ! 
Back unrepentant we will veer the sail 

When Po shall lave the summits of Matinus ; 
When into ocean juts the Apennine ; 

When herds no longer fear the tawny lions ; 
When nature's self becomes unnatural. 

And, love reversing all its old conditions. 
Tigers woo does, the kite pairs with the dove ; 

When into scales the he-goat smooths his fleeces. 
And quits the hill-top for the briny seas. 

So swear, swear aught that cuts us off for ever 
From the old homes, and go, one State entire, 
Accursing the return. If all not willing, 



the simple meaning of the line, but the literal construction is, that he 
shall scatter the bones of Romulus, hitherto free, in their secret place, 
from wind and sun. Elsewhere (Car. iii. 3, 16) Horace speaks of 
Romulus as rapt to heaven, according to the popular belief. Varro, 
according to Porphyrion, says the tomb of Romulus was behind the 
Rostra. Orelli suggests that Romulus (Quirinus) is not literally signified 
in the verse, but rather symbolically, as the ideal representative {der 



EPODE XVI. 471 

Forte quid expediat communiter aut melior pars 

Malis carere quaeritis laboribus ; 
Nulla sit hac potior sententia : Phocaeorum 

Velut profugit exsecrata civitas * 
Agros atque Lares patrios, habitandaque fana 

Apris reliquit et rapacibus lupis ; 
Ire pedes quocunque ferent, quocunque per undas 

Notus vocabit, aut protervus Africus. 
Sic placet ? t an melius quis habet suadere ? Secunda 

Ratem occupare quid moramur alite ? 
Sed juremus in hsec : — Simul imis saxa renarint 

Vadis levata, ne redire sit nefas ; 
Neu conversa domum pigeat dare lintea, quando 

Padus Matina laverit cacumina, 
In mare seu celsus procurrerit Appenninus, 

Novaque monstra junxerit libidine 
Minis amor, juvet ut tigres subsidere cervis, 

Adulteretur et columba miluo, 
Credula nee ravos timeant armenta leones, 

Ametque salsa levis hircus ^quora. — 
Hsec, et quae poterunt reditus abscindere dulces, 

Eamus omnis exsecrata civitas. 



ideale representatit) of the other Roman citizens, whose bones shall be 
scattered to wind and sun. 

* *'Phoc3eorum — exsecrata civitas." ** Exsecrata" is used in a 
double sense, "binding themselves under a curse." — Macleane. The 
oath of the Phocseans, who left their city when besieged by Hai-pagus 
(Herod, i. 165) never to return till an iron bar they threw into the sea 
should float on the surface, is amplified in the oath which Horace sug- 
gests to his political friends. 

+ "Sic placet" — "placetne," the usual formula. The poet fancies 
himself addressing a meeting of the citizens. — Macleane. 

X " In the deep bosom of the ocean buried."— Shakespeare. 



472 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

At least that part which is of nobler mind 

Than the unteachable herd. To beds ill-omened 
Let those nought hoping, those nought daring, cling. 

Ye in whom manhood lives, cease woman wailings, 
Wing the sail far beyond Etruscan shores. 

Lo ! where awaits an all-circumfluent ocean — 
Fields, the Blest Fields we seek, the Golden Isles 

Where teems a land that never knows the ploughshare — 
Where, never needing pruner, laughs the vine — 

Where the dusk fig adorns the stem it springs from,* 
And the glad olive ne'er its pledge belies t — 

There from the creviced ilex wells the honey ; 
There, down the hillside bounding light, the rills 

Dance with free foot, whose fall is heard in music ; 
There, without call, the she-goat yields her milk, 

And back to browse, with unexhausted udders, 
Wanders the friendly flock ; no hungry bear 

Growls round the sheepfold in the starry gloaming, J 
Nor high with rippling vipers heaves the soil. § 

These, and yet more of marvel, shall we witness, 
We, for felicity reserved ; how ne'er 

Dank Eurus sweeps the fields with flooding rain-storm, 

* Viz., ungrafted. 

+ "Nunquam fallentis termes olivas." The olive crop is still as 
fickle as the English hop crop — one good year for two bad ones is the 
accredited average. The olive crop, like the hop, was and still is often 
ruinous, from the speculative gambling which its uncertainty tends to 
stimulate. Horace says that which came home to every olive-grower 
when he speaks of an olive-tree that never deceived its cultivator. 

J " Vespertinus ursus. " 

§ "Neque intumescit alta viperis humus." Orelli, in one of those 
notes, exquisite for accuracy of perception, in which his edition is so 
rich, objects to the common translation of "alta humus" — mountainous 
or rising ground, in which vipers are not found. He suggests, on 
various Greek authorities, that "alta," in its sense of "deep," not 
"high," has the signification of "fertile" (we say a deep rich soil, 
in antithesis to a thin poor one) ; and to those who dissent from that 



EPODE XVI. 473 

Aut pars indocili melior grege ; mollis et exspes 

Inominata perprimat cubilia ! 
Vos, quibus est virtus, muliebrem tollite luctum, 

Etrusca prseter et volate litora. 
Nos manet Oceanus circumvagus : arva, beata 

Petamus arva divites et insulas ; 
Reddit ubi Cererem tellus inarata quotannis, 

Et imputata floret usque vinea, 
Germinat et nunquam fallentis termes olivae, f 

Suamque pulla ficus ornat arborem, 
Mella cava manant ex ilice, montibus altis 

Levis crepante lympha desilit pede. 
Illic injussae veniunt ad mulctra capellae, 

Refertque tenta grex amicus ubera -, 
Nee vespertinus circumgemit ursus ovile, % 

Neque intumescit alta viperis humus. § 
Pluraque felices mirabimur : ut neque largis 

Aquosus Eurus arva radat imbribus, || 

interpretation, Orelli commends Jahn's proposed construction to take 
"alta" with "intumescit" — "swells high." Macleane indorses it. 
Orelli refers "tumescit" not to the sweltering venom, but to the 
undulous movement of the reptile, alternately rising and falling, so 
that the ground literally seems to heave, as the commentator in Orelli 
says he has himself noticed, in his solitary walks along the meadows 
and water-banks of Italy, which, but for the vipers, would have been 
exceedingly pleasant. In the translation it is sought to render this 
idea, drawn from the critic's personal observation, and which, as a 
friend suggests, is in curious accordance with a passage in Humboldt's 
' Aspects of Nature,' where he describes the reptiles, snakes, breaking 
their way through the clay soil left by the inundations of the Orinoco, 
and lifting the ground into little heaps. Ritter finds fault with Orel- 
li's interpretation, and contends that "alta" denotes the high grass and 
herbage of the soil. 

il "Aquosus Eurus arva radat imbribus." The literal and vemacular 
meaning of "rado" is "to shave, " as " radere caput;" " radere lit- 
tora " (generally construed " to coast along ") is better interpreted by 
the phrase familiar enough to our English sailor, " to shave the shore." 
Orelli here construes "radat" "deluges," or "lays waste." 



474 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Nor rich seeds parch within the sweltering glebe. 

Either extreme the King of Heaven has tempered. 
Thither ne'er rowed the oar of Argonaut, 

The impure Colchian never there had footing. 
There Sidon's trader brought no lust of gain ; 

No weary toil there anchored with Ulysses ; 
Sickness is known not ; on the tender lamb 

No ray falls baneful from one star in heaven. 
When Jove's decree alloyed the golden age, 

He kept these shores for one pure race secreted ; 
For ail beside the golden age grew brass 

Till the last centuries hardened to the iron, 
Whence to the pure in heart a glad escape,* 

By favour of my prophet-strain is given.t 



* "Quoram" depends on "fuga" — flight from the iron ages. 
" Piis " has the signification of "pure from crime." 

t It has been supposed by some that the description of these happy 
islands, and the idea of migrating thither, is taken from the account ot 
the Western Islands, which almost tempted Sertorius to seek in them 
a refuge from the cares of his life, and the harassment of unceasing 
wars. This story, which is told by Plutarch in his life of Sertorius, is 
said by Acron to have been given by Sallust. But the general tradi- 
tion of a happy land separated from the rest of the world was popular 
among the ancients from the earliest time, and Horace might have got 
the notion from Hesiod or Pindar. The poem, however, would assume 
a much deeper and more earnest character if we could suppose that 
the passage in question has a symbolical signification, and refers to the 
isle of happy souls in which Achilles was wed to Helen. In that case 
the latent meaning would apply to another world beyond this, and its 
moral would be, " Rather than submit to the ills and ignominy in store 
for us, let us take our chance of those seats in Elysium reserved for the 
pure." 



EPODE XVI. 475 

Pinguia nee siccis urantur semina glebis ; 

Utmmque rege temperante caelitum. 
Non hue Argoo eontendit remige pinus, 

Neque impudiea Colchis intuUt pedem ; 
Non hue Sidonii torserunt eornua nautae, 

Laboriosa nee eohors UHxei. 
Nulla noeent peeori eontagia, nuUius astri 

Gregem sestuosa torret impotentia. 
Jupiter ilia pi^ seerevit litora genti, 

Ut inquinavit sere tempus aureum ; 
^re, dehine ferro duravit ssecula ; quorum * 

Piis secunda, vate me, datur fuga. 



476 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 



EPODE XVII. j 

1 

.] 

TO CANIDIA — IN APOLOGY. 

This poem completes Horace's attacks on Canidia by an ' 

ironical pretence of submission and apology. I state in i 

a note my conjecture that he was really suffering from an , 
illness when it was written. There is no reason to infer 

with 1 

Now, O now, I submit to the might of thy science ; i 

Now behold, as a suppliant, I lift up my hands ! j 

I adjure thee by Proserpine, and by great Hecate — | 

I adjure thee by all the most pitiless Powers — > 
I adjure thee by all thy weird black-books of magic, 

Strong in charms to call down loosened stars from the 

sky — i 

Dread Canidia, O spare me thy grim incantations ! i 

And O slacken, O slacken, thy swift- whirling wheel ! * : 

Even Telephus moved the fierce grandson of Nereus,+ < 

Against whom he had marshalled, in insolent pride, ! 

The host of his Mysians, and levelled his arrows ; — I 

Even Hector the homicide (sternly consigned ! 
To the maw of the dog and the beak of the vulture) 

Weeping matrons of Troy were allowed to embalm, | 

After Priam, alas (his stout walls left behind him) ] 

At the feet of the stubborn Achilles knelt down. 

So the rowers of toil-worn Ulysses, witch Circe I 

Released from the force of enchantment, at will, ' 



* " Citumque retro solve, solve turbinem." All the MSS. have 
"solve." Lambinus has "volve" v^ithout authority. "Turbo" is a 
wheel of some sort used by sorceresses ; " rhombos" is the Greek name 
for it. Ovid, Propertius, and Martial mention it. — Macleane. This 
critic considers that "retro solvere" means to relax the onward motion 
of the wheel, which will then of itself roll back. I may observe that 



EPODE XVII. 477 

with some, that, because he says his hair was turning grey, 
the verses were written in later Hfe. " But now at thirty 
years my hair is grey," says Byron. At what age Horace 
detected his first grey hair — and he became grey early — no 
one can guess. The poem has all the character of the 
early. ones comprised in this book. It is the only epode in 
which the same metre (trimeter iambic) is adopted. 



Carm. XVII. 

Jam jam efficaci do manus scientise, 
Supplex, et oro regna per Proserpinae, 
Per et Dianae non movenda numina. 
Per atque libros carminum valentium 
Refixa caelo devocare sidera, 
Canidia, parce vocibus tandem sacris, 
Citumque retro solve, solve turbinem.^ 
Movit nepotem Telephus ]^ereium,t 
In quem superbus ordinarat agmina 
Mysorum, et in quem tela acuta torserat. 
Unxere matres Ilise addictum feris 
Alitibus atque canibus homicidam Hectorem, 
Postquam relictis moenibus rex procidit 
Heu ! pervicacis ad pedes Achillei. 
Setosa duris exuere pellibus 
Laboriosi remiges Ulixei, 



"turbo," which means both a whirlwind and a spinning-top, probably 
implies the shape of the witch's wheel, as being wide at its upper part 
(the hoop), and spiral at the bottom. Party-coloured threads attached 
to it formed a web to entangle the victim operated upon. 

+ Telephus, king of Mysia, opposed the Greeks on their expedition 
to Troy, was wounded by Achilles, grandson of Nereus, and son of 
Thetis. Achilles cured him by the scrapings of the spear with which 
he was wounded. 



478. THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Giving back to limbs bristled"'^ the voice and the reason, 

And the glory that dwells in the aspect of Man. 
Enough, and much more than enough, for all penance 

Thy wrath has inflicted, O greatly beloved — 
O greatly beloved both by huckster and sailor ! t 

Fled away from my form is the vigour of youth. 
And the blush-rose of health from my cheeks has departed, 

Leaving nought but pale bones scantly covered with 
skin. 
And my hair is grown grey with, the spell of thy perfumes ; 

From my suffering I snatch not a moment's repose. 
Still the night vexes day, and still day the night vexes ; 

I can free not the lungs strained with gaspings for breath. J 
Wherefore, wretch that I am, I confess myself conquered; 

I acknowledge the truth I had dared to deny ; 
Yes, the chant of a Samnite can rattle a bosom. 

And the Marsian's witch-ditty can split up a head ! 
What more wouldst thou have ? Earth and Sea ! I am 
hotter 

Than Alcides in fell Nessian venom imbued. 
Or than Sicily's flame budding fresh in fierce ^tna.§ 

Dost thou mean, then, for ever to keep up this fire — 

* Previously transformed to swine. Bentley's reading of Circ<3; in- 
stead of Circ<? (the Latin instead of the Greek termination), founded on 
the statement of Valerius Probus, is adopted by all the more recent 
editors. 

+ As the lowest of the low. 

t " Neque est 
Levare tenta spiritu prascordia." 
The symptoms described are those of a real malady — emaciation, 
fever, sleeplessness, difficulty of breathing — a malady familiar enough 
to those who have experienced an Italian malaria. The whole poem 
seems to me to have the air of being written at some period of actual 
illness, in the attempt to draw amusement from humorous exaggeration 
of his own complaints, which is common enough among witty invalids. 
The nature of the poem would perhaps scarcely suggest itself to him if 
he were quite well in health at the time. 



EPODE XVII. 479 

Volente Circa, membra ; ^ tunc mens et sonus 

Relapsus, atque notus in voltus honor. 

Dedi satis superque poenanim tibi, 

Amata nautis multum et institoribus.t 

Fugit juventas, et verecundus color 

Reliquit ossa pelle amicta lurida ; 

Tuis capillus albiis est odoribus ; 

Nullum ab labore me reclinat otium ; 

Urget diem nox, et dies noctem, neque est 

Levare tenta spiritu prsecordia.J 

Ergo negatum vincor ut credam miser, 

Sabella pectus increpare carmina, 

Caputque Marsa dissilire nenia. 

Quid amplius vis ? O mare, O terra ! ardeo, 

Quantum neque atro delibutus Hercules 

Nessi cruore, nee Sicana fervida 

Virens in ^tna flammaj§ tu, donee cinis 

Injuriosis aridus ventis ferar, 



§ "Nee Sicana fervida 
Virens in ^tna flamma." 
I take *' virens" to have the same signification here that it has Lib. IV. 
Cami. xiii. 6, "Virentis doctse psallere Chise " — i.e., youthful, bloom- 
ing or budding, in the spring of life. ' ' Virens flamma" may be compared 
with Lucretius's *' Flos flammge." I agree, therefore, with Macleane, 
who follows Lambinus and the scholiast in Cruquius, in interpreting the 
meaning to be "the flame, always fresh and renewing itself," and hav- 
ing no more to do with the colour of the flame as of sulphurous green, 
which is the supposition favoured by Orelli and Dillenburger, than it 
has in the line quoted above, where it is certainly not meant to imply 
that Chia is "green." The emendation of "furens," suggested by 
Bentley on inferior MS. authority, and rejected by most recent com- 
mentators, would substitute a prosaic commonplace for a poetic image. 



4^0 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

thou warehouse of venomous fuel from Colchis, — 

Till I'm whirled, a parched cinder, the waif of the winds ? 
What the death that awaits or the fine that redeems me ? 

Every penalty asked I will honestly pay : 
Speak ! a hundred young steers ; or a couple of stanzas 

To be sung to a lute-string attuned to a lie, 

1 will chant thee as chaste, I will chant thee as honest; 

Thou shalt traverse, a gold constellation, the stars. 
Moved by prayer Castor's self, and the twin of great 
Castor, 

Gave back sight to the bard who had Helen defamed.* 
So mayst thou, for thou canst, from this frenzy release 
me — 

O thou, by no filth-scum paternal defiled t — 
O thou who didst never, an aged wise-woman,J 

From his grave the first day§ rake a beggar-man's dust ! 
O thy breast is the kindest, thy hands are the purest 

On earth ; Pactumeius is really thy son ; || 
And whenever thou bearest the pangs of a mother, 

'Tis to rise from thy bed with the bloom of a maid ! 



* " Infamis Helense Castor offensus vicem, 
Fraterque magni Castoris, victi prece." 
The poet alluded to is Stesichorus, punished with blindness for libel- 
ling Helen, and recovering his sight after writing an apology (palinodia), 
of which a fragment remains. Other writers ascribe to Helen the grace 
of restoring the poet's sight. Probably Horace follows some other 
version of the story lost to us, in attributing the restoration to her two 
brothers. The allusion to Castor and Pollux, twin stars, comes natu- 
rally enough after saying that Canidia shall become a constellation 
herself. 

t "Obsoleta." This word, as Macleane observes, is applied in an 
unusual sense. It usually signifies "that which is gone to decay," '*out 
of use ; " and so it comes to mean that which is spoilt and worthless (in 
which sense Macleane implies that he would take it here). Orelli, I 
think, better explains it as " inquinata," " deformata." I apprehend that 
"inquinata," in the sense of "stained," or "defiled," is the right 
meaning — as in Seneca (Agam. 971, a line which appears to have 



EPODE XVII. 481 

Cales venenis officina Colchicis. 

Quae finis, aut quod me manet stipendlum ? 

Effare ; jussas cum fide poenas luam, 

Paratus expiare, seu poposceris 

Centum juvencos, sive mendaci lyra 

Voles sonari : tu pudica, tu proba 

Perambulabis astra sidus aureum. 

Infamis Helenae Castor ofiensus vicem, 

Fraterque magni Castoris, victi prece,* 

Adempta vati reddidere lumina. 

Et tu, potes nam, solve me dementia, 

O nee patemis obsoletat sordibus, 

Neque in sepulcris paupemm prudens anus f 

Novendiales dissipare pulveres.§ 

Tibi hospitale pectus et pur^ manus, 

Tuusque venter Pactumeius,|| et tuo 

Cruore rubros obstetrix pannos lavit, 

Utcunque fi^rtis exilis puerpera. 

escaped the commentators on the passage), "Dextera obsoleta san- 
gume." 

+ " Neque in sepulcris paupemm prudens anus." Macleane, in his 
note on Canidia, Epode iii. p. 280, observes, that Horace says Canidia 
is not an old woman, and refers to this very line as proving it. It 
proves just the contrary. Horace, speaking in the most obvious irony, 
had before asked if he should celebrate her with a lying lyre, and all he 
is now saying about her is, of course, to be read in the opposite sense. 

§ "Novendiales pulveres." This has been variously interpreted; 
but Orelli and all recent commentators agree in accepting the general 
authority of Servius, Ad. JEn. 5, that the ashes were buried the ninth 
day after death — the body having been burned on the eighth. Probably 
enough the poor were not kept so long above ground ; but the phrase 
"novendiales" might have come into conventional usage as signifying 
the first day of burial. It means, at all events, fresh buried, while 
wai-mth was yet in the ashes — that being essential for the purposes of 
witchcraft ; and the ashes were scattered and reduced to powder for 
those purposes. 

II "Tuusque venter Pactumeius." It would seem that the person, 
whoever she might have been, represented by Canidia, was rather sen- 

2 H 



482 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 



CANIDIA'S REPLY. 

" Why on ears locked against thee pour prayer unavaiHng ? 

Not more deaf to the sailor, stripped bare to the skin, 
Are the rocks upon which, in the depth of the winter, 

Breaks in thunder the reef of a merciless sea. 
What, forsooth ! raise a laugh at the rites of Cotytto'^ 

Divulged ? Mock the Cupid of Cupids most free ? 
As if thou wert high-priest to the witchcraft of charnels, 

And in safety mightst make a town-talk of my name I 
What my gain to have squandered on beldames Pelignian 

My gold, and have mixed up the poisons most quick ? 
Yet they are not so quick, but their work shall seem tardy t 

To thy longings for death to escape from thy pain. 
Ay, for this shall thy thankless existence be lengthened, 

That with every new day there shall come a new pang. 
For reprieve sighed the father of Pelops the faithless, 

Hungry Tantalus, yearning in vain for the food ; 
For reprieve sighed Prometheus, fast bound to the vulture, 

And Sisyphus upward vain-heaving the stone. 
But reprieve is just that which Jove's law has denied thee. 

So shalt thou, in the weary revolt from thy woes, 
Now wish to leap down from the height of a turret, 

Now with Norican blade to gash open thy breast, 
And to garland thy throat with a noose, but wish vainly. 

Conquered foe, on thy shoulders in state I will ride, 
And the earth shall acknowledge my scorn and my triumph. 

What ! shall I who, as thou, curious fool, knowest well. 
Mould and move human life in the wax of an image ; 

Who can snatch with my chantings the moon from the 
sky; 



sitive to the charge of sterility, or that, for some reason or other, she 
had palmed off a supposititious child (Pactumeius) as her own. In the 
former poem on Canidia, Horace had implied a doubt if she had any 



EPODE XVII. 483 



CANIDIA. 

' Quid obseratis auribus fundis preces ? 
Non saxa nudis surdiora navitis 
Neptunus alto tundit hibernus salo. 
Inultus ut tu riseris Cotyttia"^ 
Vulgata, sacrum liberi Cupidinis, 
Et Esquilini Pontifex venefici 
Impune ut Urbem nomine impleris meo ? 
Quid proderat ditasse Pelignas anus, 
Velociusve miscuisse toxicum ? 
Sed tardiora fata te votis manent : t 
Ingrata misero vita ducenda est in hoc, 
Novis ut usque suppetas laboribus. 
Optat quietem Pelopis infidi pater, 
Egens benignae Tantalus semper dapis ; 
Optat Prometheus obligatus aliti; 
Optat supremo coUocare Sisyphus 
In monte saxum ; sed vetant leges Jovis. 
Voles modo altis desilire turribus, 
Modo ense pectus Norico recludere, 
Frustraque vincla gutturi nectes tuo, 
Fastidiosa tristis aegrimonia. 
Vectabor humeris tunc ego inimicis eques, 
Meaeque terra cedet insolentise. 
An quae movere cereas imagines, 
Ut ipse nosti curiosus, et polo 
Deripere lunam vocibus possim meis, 

real offspring, " Si vocata partubiis Lucina veris afFuit." He now ironi- 
cally appears to make it up with her, by declaring that Pactumeius is 
really her son. Ritter has partumeius instead of Pactumeius. 

* The rites of Cotytto, of Thracian origiuj'^were celebrated only by 
women, with one presiding priest. 

+ " Sed tardiora fata te votis manent." There is dispute about the 
reading and interpretation of this passage. I adopt those sanctioned by 
Orelli and Macleane, 



484 THE EPODES OF HORACE. 

Who can raise up the dead, though consumed into ashes, 
And can temper at pleasure the bowl of desire ; — 

What ! shall I bring mine arts to an end in lamenting 
That they have not the slightest effect upon thee?" 



EPODE XVII. 



485 



Possim cremates excitare mortuos, 
Desiderique temperare pocula, 
Plorem artis, in te nil agentis, exitus ? 



THE END. 



PKINTKD BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH 



LE 



J i. 




